Breaking Free
by BookishGal
Summary: Incarceration is merely a minor inconvenience when Hannibal Lecter begins playing a delicate game with Clarice Starling. Follows "Silence" movie canon with one change. Rated T for occasional language and sexually suggestive themes.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's note:** The story follows movie canon for "Silence of the Lambs," with the exception of the change that shows up in Chapter 1. For the timeline, assume the events of the movie take place in the year of its release – 1991 – and that the following events take place in 1991-92, with technology and cultural references appropriate to those years. The characters' ages have not been altered, so you'll simply have to suspend disbelief on that count.

I do try to respond promptly to every review, so if there's something you like or dislike in the story or if you have a question, just let me know.

Thanks again go to Green Jewels for her support and encouragement.

**Disclaimer:** Nothing is mine but the use of these particular words in this particular order. Everything else goes home to its proper copyright owner at last call.

* * *

><p><strong>June 15, 1991<strong>

"Or comincio a regnare, ora incomincio la mia felicità."

Hannibal Lecter shifted minutely in his seat – sixth row, center – to better catch the beautiful irony unfolding on stage. The false king's death was nearly upon him, delivered by the hand of a trusted ambassador.

"Quanto ti devo, o caro amico."

And then the knife, yes, the elegant silver flash that severed soul from body and left nothing but meat to be consumed or discarded as one chose. The doctor's mouth opened slightly, his tongue pressing against the back of his upper incisors. Red silks stood in for blood, more's the pity. So few were willing to die for their art.

A sound intruded upon his thoughts. Not from the stage; not the coughs of the man a dozen seats to his left, a habitual smoker by the sound; not the heavy breathing of the boor back and to the right who seemed to have fallen asleep during the third act. No, this was something else, something _other_.

The action on stage paused, the newly revealed Mitridate frozen in the midst of stabbing his usurping cousin cum stepfather, as the doctor traced the sound to its source.

Footsteps, two sets. One quite familiar, one … well now, that really _was_ surprising. Certainly worth leaving the opera. It wasn't as though he couldn't return to enjoy the performance again.

Hannibal Lecter opened his eyes to the bare ceiling of the cell he had occupied for the last eight years save for his recent, regrettably brief sojourn in Memphis. He pressed a hand against the wall as he got to his feet; the thin pallet on the stone floor didn't have the height of his former cot, which had been confiscated upon his return to Baltimore. It wouldn't do to greet his visitor in such an undignified state. He lightly brushed off the drab blue jumpsuit with a few swipes of his right hand, though truly nothing but burning could improve its condition. Prison garb was far from the height of fashion.

He stepped forward and clasped his hands courteously behind his back, patiently waiting, his ears attuned to the footfalls now nearing his cell.

Barney appeared first, a metal folding chair in hand.

"Visitor for you, Doctor. Figured you'd want her to have a chair an' all, even if you haven't got one yourself."

"Yes, thank you, Barney; you're quite correct."

The orderly nodded before turning his attention to the chair, which he unfolded and set precisely in the center of the hall.

The "her" under discussion moved into view. The rhythmic sound of Clarice Starling's steps faltered as she took in the emptiness of the cell – the walls, the floor, the pallet little more than a layer of hardened foam, all bare but for the man standing two feet beyond the Plexiglas barrier. The doctor detected a flash of concern on her face before she mastered her expression. Something new lay there as well, a dark smudge of some kind below her right eye. Curious.

Barney gently patted the back of the chair.

"You let me know if there's anything else you need, Clarice. I'll be watching."

She nodded, her hair bobbing a bit as she turned to address the orderly. It had grown a little longer, Lecter saw, and the ends were slightly ragged.

"Thank you, Barney. I'm sure we'll be fine." The soft West Virginian drawl still clung to her voice. Lecter noted with some consternation that he had missed hearing her curiously improper inflections in the weeks since their last parting.

The orderly nodded to Clarice and Lecter and then departed.

Lecter kept his silence as he studied the young woman before him. She had worn gray slacks and a short-sleeved pale blue blouse to this meeting – what she might, in her own mind, term churchgoing clothes, he suspected. Without a suit coat, the effect was no doubt too feminine for her to wear to work, where she almost certainly affected as masculine a persona in dress and mannerism as was possible for her.

She eyed the chair with suspicion and carefully inspected it, running her fingers along the underside and every edge, twisting it this way and that. _Checking for unwanted ears, are we, Clarice?_

Finished with her inspection, Clarice stood up straight and truly looked at him for the first time since she had walked in. Her head tilted five degrees to the right.

"Will you speak with me today, Doctor?"

"You wish to re-establish our acquaintance, Clarice? I hadn't realized they would find you a new serial killer to chase so quickly. I notice you aren't carrying a case file with you today."

She paused before answering, but her face gave no indication that his words had affected her.

"Do you mind if I sit, Doctor?"

"By all means, Clarice, make yourself comfortable. Feel free to remove your shoes if you wish; I see their quality, sadly, has not improved."

She sat slightly forward in the chair, her back arrow-straight.

"No, it hasn't. I see you're going barefoot yourself these days, Doctor."

"Yes, I believe Freddie needed a new pair for himself and he quite fancied mine, you see."

He was rewarded with a smile. No teeth showing, but a smile nonetheless, at least until it faded to a frown.

"I feel as though I should be expressing my sympathies for your current circumstances, Doctor, which puts me in a rather awkward position."

"You find it difficult, as an officer of the law, to commiserate with me over my failed escape attempt, Special Agent Trainee Starling?"

"I can hardly say I wish it had been successful, Doctor, and yet…." She gestured to the bare walls surrounding him. "I can't say I'm pleased with the outcome of failure, either."

"I appreciate the thought, Clarice, but you needn't concern yourself. If it weren't for my actions in Memphis, Freddie would merely have found another pretext for playing his little games."

She nodded, either in agreement or acceptance that the subject was closed. Her face, however, remained troubled.

"Is there something you would like to add, Clarice? You're thinking quite loudly over there."

"It's, uh, it's not 'trainee' anymore, Doctor." She cleared her throat. "I graduated this morning."

"Truly? My apologies, Special Agent Starling. Had I known, I would have procured an appropriate gift. My mail has been a bit slow these last few weeks." He narrowed his eyes as he pondered the full context of her revelation. "Shouldn't you be celebrating the joyous occasion with your classmates this afternoon?"

"They're hosting a post-ceremony luncheon at the academy, yeah, but it's really an excuse to drink free booze and mingle with everyone's families. It's not my scene, Doctor."

"Because you have no family with which to share your success, Clarice?"

She shrugged.

"Partly, yes. Mostly because it's a waste of time to stand around gabbing with parents and spouses of folks I won't even be working with 'cause we have different division assignments. What would be the point?"

He let the comment pass for now; for all her ambition, Clarice Starling was in some ways a naïve young woman. Well, she would learn. Either networking with colleagues would help her rise in the Bureau's ranks or her passion for justice and her obsession with saving the innocent would isolate her until she could no longer move in any direction. Time would tell.

"So you rejected an afternoon spent with your fellow officers of the law, all of whom are enjoying the loving attention of their families, to come and sit here in this dungeon with me? I'm flattered, Clarice. You must be quite eager to get started on this new case of yours."

Her eyes widened before she looked away, embarrassed or ashamed, it seemed to him.

"Um, there's not a case, Doctor. I guess this is… more in the nature of a social call." Her cheeks were slightly pink when she raised her head. "I just… well, I wanted to thank you for your help with Buffalo Bill. I would have come sooner, but Dr. Chilton" – her face turned stormy at the mere mention of his name, and Lecter inwardly reveled at their shared distaste for the petty little man – "refused on the grounds that your escape attempt merited additional security precautions. I didn't have the clout to change his mind."

"Surely Jackie-boy would have backed his rising star."

Clarice's brow furrowed and she tugged at her lower lip with her teeth. Confusion and some distress, he thought. A crack in her faith?

"Mr. Crawford suggested that it would be better if I didn't visit."

"Did he, now? Why is that, do you suppose?"

Clarice raised an eyebrow, an impudent look of patent disbelief on her face.

"Really, Doctor?" she drawled. "Let's see… he's already warned me about talking to you several times; tongues have been wagging all over the Bureau and Justice, too, speculating on just why you talked to me anyway; the case is over, so there's no longer a need for your expertise… take your pick."

"You wound me, Clarice. You neglected to mention my charming personality."

"With good reason, Doctor. It hardly would have helped my cause to tell Mr. Crawford that I thought I might visit a notorious serial killer because he's an intelligent, witty conversationalist. The FBI would have found a way to retroactively fail me on my psych eval."

"Compliments, Clarice? Are you _certain_ there isn't something you want from me?"

She laughed. It was a lovely laugh, he thought; he resolved to bring it about again before she departed.

"Sometimes, Doctor, a truth is just a truth. And the only thing I want is for you to know that your help was invaluable in saving Catherine Martin's life. I wouldn't have been in time if you hadn't pointed me in the right direction again and again."

"I didn't do it for her, Clarice." He left the other half unsaid, knowing she would intuit his meaning without it. Or she might come to the wrong conclusion entirely; it was hard to say. She was unpredictable at times, his lovely little Starling.

From the tilt of her head, though, she had caught at least something of his intent.

"Well… thank you anyway, Doctor. Whatever your reasons, the outcome benefited Catherine."

"Hmm. Things didn't turn out quite so well for old Buffalo Bill, I hear."

"You saw the papers?" Her expression showed surprise, and no wonder.

"Don't be ridiculous, Clarice; no, Freddie hasn't allowed me access to the outside world. Barney was kind enough to relay to me the outcome of your adventure in Ohio. Congratulations on your first kill. Tell me, what did you like best about shooting a man to death?"

He delighted in the minute changes in her face. She inhaled sharply first, through her nose, her lips tightening to a thin line. Her eyes hardened. The muscles in her neck twitched, but she refused to look away. Her anger was exquisite; he was quite pleased to have provoked it.

Finally, her jaw tight, she gritted out, "That he didn't shoot me to death first."

"Oh, come now, Clarice, that's cheating."

"Whatdya want me to say, Doctor?" He inwardly smirked as her drawl grew more pronounced in her anger.

"The truth, Agent Starling; only that, and nothing more."

She sighed, shoulders heaving beneath the inferior cotton of her blouse. Her lips pursed; her gaze dropped to the floor, fixing on a point somewhere between them. He waited in silence.

"It was dark. Real dark. Not like city dark – like country dark, out in a holler on a moonless night. Proper dark, you know?"

Her eyes flicked upward briefly, and he nodded to indicate his understanding. Yes, he knew the darkness of moonless nights in the wilderness only too well.

"I knew he was huntin' me down there in the dark. Every whisper of air coulda been him standin' right aside me, ready to drop a bullet in my skull."

Her hand rubbed against her cheek, just below her eye. When her fingers fell away, the smudge remained as it had been. A burn? Gunpowder, he realized, carefully concealing his startlement. There must have been more to the shooting than Barney's recounting had covered. He segregated the twinge of distress her close brush with death caused; it was something to think over later, after she had gone.

"An' then I heard it – the click when he cocked his gun. If I didn't shoot, I was gonna die, an' Catherine was gonna die, an' I had promised her I was coming back. I found her first, you know, before the lights went out."

She shook her head, lost in some thought, and he resisted the urge to draw it out of her before she had finished.

"So I pulled the trigger. Couldn't even see him, really, except in the muzzle flash, until a stray bullet broke a window. I fired until I came up empty, an' then I reloaded quick, just in case I had missed. An' what I liked best, Doctor, was knowing that I wasn't gonna die a meaningless death on a filthy floor at the hands of some shitty criminal the way my daddy did."

She looked up at him with real anger in her eyes now.

"So like I said before you_ accused me of cheating_, I liked best that he didn't shoot me to death first. Does that answer your question?"

He gave her a moment to compose herself, which also gave him the pleasure of watching her do so. The anger in her face receded, but the tension held her thin frame stiffly upright, and she couldn't quite bank the coals in her eyes.

"It does, Clarice," he said, his tone mild as milk. "Thank you."

He waited another moment as his response sank in and further mollified her anger. Then, quickly, like a physician slipping in the needle once his young patient had been sufficiently distracted, he added, "But I do have follow-up questions. What did your lamb do when you left her behind to hunt Mr. Gumb, Clarice? Did she cry out for you? How did that make you feel?"

She must have felt the prick of guilt keenly still to shoot to her feet as rapidly as she did, he thought. Alas, no charming outburst accompanied her movement, no unconsidered words to more easily enhance his understanding of the fledgling agent. No, she mastered herself quickly, clearing her throat and re-seating herself. _Good girl, Clarice_.

"I think you'll find I already answered a question, Doctor. Tell me, had you planned how your escape would happen before you set foot on the plane?"

Oh, she _was_ daring. He quite enjoyed provoking her; her responses were enormously fascinating and fun.

"Are we playing games again, Clarice? I thought this visit was in the nature of a social call."

Clarice casually crossed her legs and tucked her feet beneath the chair. She gave every appearance of an old friend enjoying a chat before afternoon tea was served.

"It would be rude of me to monopolize the conversation talking only about myself, Doctor, wouldn't you agree?"

He had to admire her aplomb. She had recovered swiftly from his assault, launched her own offense, and calmly parried his riposte.

"I see you've gotten better at this game, Special Agent Starling."

"I see you're avoiding answering the question, Dr. Lecter."

Perhaps she did deserve something for her effort.

"Very well, Clarice. It hardly matters now, does it? Yes, I had some idea of the necessary events; however, one must always accept that plans bow to chance and circumstance. One cannot account for every variable, no matter how one tries. Unfortunately, my plan proved too inflexible to accommodate the ultimate circumstances in Memphis."

"If you couldn't make it work, I doubt anyone could have, Doctor," she murmured, her eyes distant.

"It's kind of you to say so, my dear. Now, I believe it's your turn to answer. Shall I repeat the question?"

"No, Doctor, I remember it well enough."

She lapsed into silence, and he allowed it to stand. Minutes ticked by.

"He had her in a pit in the floor. I didn't have a way to get her out. The room was open – too many points of entry to watch. She'd been screaming; that's how I found her. She begged me to help her, get her outta there. I tried to explain the situation, but she was too terrified to listen. I told her I had to leave; that made her angry. She started cursing at me, an' I told her… I told her to shut up. I left her there, trapped an' sobbing."

The doctor lowered his eyelids to conceal his joy in her confession. He'd seen her determination, experienced firsthand her willingness to deceive a criminal, but to hear her admit to such ruthless treatment of a victim, a _lamb_, was thrilling.

He knew, now, that he had not been wrong about her potential. It hummed within her, a melody that might be nudged into harmony with his own.

"As for how I felt about it, Doctor, how do you expect I felt? I did the expedient thing, the necessary thing; I didn't have to like it."

"And the lambs, Clarice? Did saving Catherine Martin silence them?"

She looked away.

"No, Doctor. Not for long."

"She curses you in this nocturnal chorus of yours, doesn't she, Clarice?"

His fledgling's eyes darted to his.

"Are you quite sure you aren't Catholic, my dear? You carry an overabundance of guilt with you."

She snorted, shaking her head. It wasn't a laugh, but it would do, he thought.

"Quite sure, Doctor. I've been Baptist, and I've been Lutheran, and I've sat in church on Sundays singing hymns and mouthing prayers, but I can't say it really took. I don't suppose I'm about to try it a third time."

The sound of footsteps intruded on his ears as she spoke. He found he was loathe to let the conversation end, not knowing whether she might ever return. It was a problem to consider in the days to come; he had little else of importance to occupy his time.

Clarice's head turned toward the hallway; she must have noticed the footsteps as well.

Barney looked almost bashful as he came into the doctor's view.

"Sorry, Clarice, but your time's up. Dr. Lecter's visiting hours have been restricted for—

"—security reasons, of course, Barney," Clarice finished in unison with the orderly. "It's all right. I hope escorting me hasn't gotten you in trouble."

"Naw, I'll be fine."

Clarice stood and looked at the doctor, her expression unsure.

"It was… good… to see you, Doctor. Thank you again for your assistance."

He nodded courteously.

"Congratulations on your accomplishment, Clarice." He left open whether he intended her graduation, her rescue of the Martin girl, her killing of Jame Gumb or something else entirely. Let her interpret his well wishes as she would.

She nodded once in return and left, Barney following close behind.

Dr. Lecter listened to her fading footsteps until they disappeared entirely. Still he waited. It was only a matter of a few minutes before Barney returned to collect the empty chair.

"Sure was nice of Clarice to stop by, don't you think, Dr. Lecter?" The orderly collapsed the chair and hoisted it under his arm.

"Yes, we had a lovely chat, Barney; thank you for facilitating."

The orderly's forehead creased.

"For your assistance, Barney."

"Ah, right. Y'all looked good together, Doctor, if you don't mind my saying so. I thought it was real sweet the way her shirt matched your jumpsuit."

"Did it? You have a keen eye, Barney." It hadn't escaped the doctor's notice that the pale blue of Clarice's blouse was a near match for the blue of the prison uniform. Had she chosen it at random, or was it deliberate? Well, he would simply have to mention it and see how she responded. Which meant….

"Barney, I wonder if you would be so kind as to do me a favor."

* * *

><p><strong>Note:<strong> The Italian at the beginning is from the libretto to _Mitridate Eupatore, _Act V, Scene II.

_Or comincio a regnare, ora incomincio la mia felicità._ = Now I begin to reign, now do I begin my happiness.

_Quanto ti devo, o caro amico._ = How much do I owe you, dear friend.


	2. Chapter 2

**July 12, 1991**

By the time Clarice got home from work, Ardelia was nearly on her way out the door. She wasn't sure how Ardelia had managed to make it home at a reasonable hour. Clarice herself had been doing grunt work tracking financial transactions, trying to build a case against suspected drug dealers, for so many hours that she'd been forced to call a halt when her eyes finally refused to focus anymore.

"Hey, girlfriend, I'm off to dinner with Evan – don't wait up, OK?" Delia smoothed down her dress and grabbed the matching clutch lying on the hall table, popping it open and surveying the contents. Nodding, she snapped it shut and picked up her keys. "Oh, and there's a box for you in the kitchen. See you tomorrow!"

She sailed out the door before Clarice had even gotten in a "hello."

Clarice shrugged, moving deeper into the house they shared. She would no doubt hear all about the date tomorrow, anyway.

She headed into her room to change out of her work clothes, returning a few moments later in running shorts and a T-shirt, toting a basket of laundry.

"It's going to be an exciting Friday night, Clarice. What do you think, whites or colors first? Oh, you're right, definitely whites. Let's save the colors for later in the evening when the party really heats up."

She passed through the kitchen to reach the attached laundry room – more of a hallway out to the back porch, really, with the washer and dryer stuck in a niche to one side. The box Ardelia had mentioned was sitting on the table. It was odd, she thought, as she sorted out the whites and dumped them in the washer. She hadn't ordered anything, and it was unlikely that anyone but Delia would have bought her something. Was it a gift from Delia? That wasn't a completely farfetched idea, but Dee would have stuck around to see her open it, at least.

Clarice measured the soap and poured it into the already filling drum. She let the lid drop and retraced her steps back to the kitchen as the washer got to work. Grabbing a Diet Coke from the fridge, she took a swig and swallowed before turning to the table.

The box wasn't very large – just a bit bigger than a ream of paper. Her name and address were handwritten on the brown paper covering, though she didn't recognize the style. She checked the top left corner; no return address. Actually… she picked up the box and twisted it every which way… no return address _and_ no postage. Someone must have dropped it off in person, she thought. _I'll have to ask Ardelia if she was here when the package arrived._

She shook it slightly. Nothing rattled, clicked, or beeped, although there was a soft _shurring_ sound. She set the package back on the table, sat down, and took another swig of Coke.

"OK, Clarice, you're being ridiculous. You're not even three weeks out of the academy; who would leave a bomb or a dead cat on your doorstep? You don't have any enemies" — _well, OK, some people were a little upset that Dr. Lecter's information led me and not them to Buffalo Bill_ – "and you can't possibly have done anything to piss off the neighbors yet. No loud parties, no junked-out cars in the yard… yeah, I think we're good here."

She pulled the package toward her side of the table but didn't move to open it yet. Her fingers tapped at the nearest edge. The package made her apprehensive. She was missing something.

With a frustrated growl, she tore open the paper at the end and pulled the box free. It was plain and white; the top simply lifted off. Like a shirt box at Christmas, she thought. She lifted the lid.

A cream-colored envelope lay atop a layer of tissue paper. Her first name was written in fancy script across the front of the envelope. She frowned as something itched at her brain, trying to get her attention. Whatever it was wasn't enough to keep her from picking up the envelope and sliding her finger under the flap. Only a single sheet lay within. Her eyes skimmed down to the bottom as she unfolded it, wanting to see who would –

_Oh, shit._

_Shit. Shit. Fuck. This is bad._

There at the bottom, staring up at her in large, flowing script:

**Faithfully yours,**

**Hannibal Lecter, M.D.**

_What the hell is he playing at? How did he even get a letter out? And who would – Barney. He must've done it._

Her eyes darted to the top of the page.

**Dear Clarice,**

**I do hope you'll forgive the forwardness of this missive. You are, undoubtedly, concerned about how receiving such a letter might reflect upon your career. Shall I say hello to dear old Jack in these lines? Perhaps you'll at least read my words before running off to report to your masters at the FBI. **

**I couldn't help but notice the poor quality of fabric you sported during your last visit, Clarice. I, sadly, have been unable to convince Freddie to improve the quality of the blue cotton jumpsuits required here, but there is no reason for you to wear similar garb, Clarice. I assure you, I will be perfectly able to contain my jealousy should you choose to wear something other than a blue cotton blouse, though it was quite thoughtful of you to match the colors so well. **

**To that end, I have enclosed your graduation gift with this letter. The cotton is summer-weight Swiss voile. I do hope you like the color.**

Clarice let the letter fall to the table and carefully parted the tissue paper in the box. Her fingers drifted down the front of the blouse. She lifted it out by the shoulders. The cotton was soft and silky smooth to the touch. The narrowing silhouette at the waist gave it a fitted, feminine appearance, despite the formal button-down collar and long sleeves. The shade was deepest purple, like a ripe eggplant, with matching buttons down the front.

It was, in a word, beautiful.

But Dr. Lecter knew her too well; she laid the shirt back in the box and reached for her phone.

"Mr. Crawford? It's Clarice Starling, sir. I'm sorry to bother you on a Friday night, but this is something that can't wait."

* * *

><p><strong>July 20, 1991<strong>

"You sent me the blouse knowing Jack Crawford would send me back here, didn't you, Doctor?"

Clarice sat in the familiar metal chair outside the doctor's cell. She was wearing his gift. The color really did suit her, he thought, pleased with his choice. Did she recognize the implications? That she had accepted him as a suitable provider?

No, not consciously, he thought; the idea would have distressed her too much at this early juncture. She was receptive to his overture without awareness or guile, just as she had accepted his towel as a courteous gesture. That what she might consider his old-fashioned courtesy was in fact what he considered a prelude to something more was of no consequence as yet. She would understand in time, and then they would see. For now, he was content to wait. He returned his attention to her question.

"Now how could I have known that, Clarice?"

Her look plainly expressed disbelief. Well, he supposed it would be difficult to pretend innocence; she well knew his capacity for insight into others' motivations and actions.

"You've played these games with Mr. Crawford before, Doctor. I haven't gotten the sense that you particularly want to help him, though."

"Perhaps it's not Jack whom I wish to help, Clarice. Tell me, have you been granted the position in Behavioral Science you're so ambitiously seeking?"

"Not yet, Doctor." She paused, the corner of her mouth quirking upward. "Although it seems I have the department's official blessing to conduct monthly meetings with a certain incarcerated individual who seems to have taken an interest in me. On a purely voluntary basis, of course, for the purposes of establishing and maintaining cordial relations that might encourage said individual to offer assistance in future cases."

"I'm shocked, Clarice. You're seeing another inmate? Why, you'll break my heart."

"Funny, Doctor." She shook her head, still smiling. "You know you're the only inmate for me."

There was more truth in that than she intended, he judged, so he let it pass without comment. Calling her attention to it would only work against his interests.

"If not Behavioral Science, then what does your venerable institution have you doing these days, Clarice?"

"Paperwork, Doctor, and lots of it. The wheels of justice grind everything into paper sooner or later."

"And do you like pushing papers, Clarice? Does it… satisfy… you?"

"Does paperwork really satisfy anyone, Doctor?" She shifted her shoulders, the blouse flowing with her skin as she moved. The effect was quite lovely, even in the deplorable lighting conditions allotted him here. "No, it doesn't satisfy me. It's one step on the path to real work."

"And how hard did you have to work to convince Jackie-boy to let you take _this_ step, Clarice? As I recall, at our last chat you indicated that he was less than enthused by the prospect of your visiting me."

"Mr. Crawford thinks I need protecting from you, Doctor." The stubborn set of her jaw was so perfectly Clarice that he nearly laughed.

"I take it you disagree."

"I don't think you have any desire to hurt me, Doctor, despite your intrusive questions." Her eyes met his confidently; her grin was wry. He was struck, once again, by how much he enjoyed her frankness. "I amuse you, maybe, and that's fine; you intrigue me, so we're even. Mr. Crawford was willing to be persuaded; he knows the value of your insights."

"And you'll be reporting to him about our chats, Clarice?"

"As they pertain to Behavioral Science business, yes." She shrugged. "Any other topics aren't his concern."

How marvelous; her loyalties had already split. She was not only prepared to share personal conversations with him, unrelated to her function as an FBI agent, but also to _suggest_ such a conspiracy herself. _Well, well, Clarice. What Jackie-boy doesn't know about you, hmm? I really must thank him for introducing us._

"So I receive the pleasure of your company, you receive a foot in the door at Behavioral Science, and dear old Jack receives my help with his cases. All of this from a simple gift."

As expected, she pounced.

"So that _is_ why you sent me the letter and the shirt. Why are you helping me, Doctor?"

"Perhaps I simply find it fitting to shower you with gifts, hmm?" He winked at her. "Now, then, we've spent far too much time discussing business, Clarice. Tell me, what do you know of opera?"

* * *

><p><strong>July 22, 1991<strong>

"So, did Lecter buy it?" Jack Crawford gestured her to the chair in front of his desk.

Clarice smiled to hide her discomfort with the question.

"He's being cooperative, sir, yes. I appreciate you running interference with Dr. Chilton to get me in."

"But was wearing the shirt helpful in gaining his trust?" His eyebrows lifted in expectation; his intent stare reminded Clarice of a bettor clutching his ticket, waiting for the ponies to cross the line and win him some money if only he believed hard enough.

"I think he appreciated the gesture." It was one she would have made anyway; it was only polite to wear the gift he had sent her. And it _was_ hers, she thought - there was nothing illegal about it; no regulation prevented the doctor, or any other inmate, from sending gifts to someone on the outside if he could arrange it. It wasn't as though she were one of his victims or their relatives.

Technically, she wasn't even obligated to turn it over to Behavioral Science at all. A gift from one private citizen to another was none of their concern. But the doctor had known she'd be tempted, had known she'd take the opportunity to insinuate herself in the department.

She hadn't needed to tell him that Jack Crawford had wanted her to wear the shirt as a deception to draw him in, or how uncomfortable the idea of trying to deceive him again made her. She hadn't needed to tell him that it wasn't the reason she had worn it after all. Come to think of it, the doctor hadn't asked why she had worn it - had barely even mentioned the shirt at all... no, not even once. She had asked about it, but he had avoided any mention of it. _Because he already knew Mr. Crawford would try to manipulate the situation? Why didn't I notice that before? Be more observant, Clarice. You're a federal investigator now, for crying out loud._

Mr. Crawford smiled, but... it was wrong somehow, she thought. A thin, gloating smile.

"I thought he might. A lot of people have tried to get in his head, Starling. So far, you're the only one he hasn't ignored or destroyed."

"It's true that he's not the easiest man to talk to, sir." _Because if you go in with less than your full attention, you'll come out chewed to pieces._ She quickly choked back a laugh. _Poor choice of words, Clarice…. Accurate, though._

"Starling..." And now Mr. Crawford was looking at her with something akin to concern. "You don't have to go through with this, you know. No one would think any less of you if you decided not to visit Lecter again."  
><em><br>Why is he... shit, does he think that was a sob? Great. Way to impress the boss, Clarice._

"Sir, I'm prepared to go forward. We've hardly even gotten started; there's no need to abandon the project so soon." _There, that sounded professional, didn't it? Like a Behavioral Science profiler should sound? So why is he still looking at me like that?  
><em>  
>"We could get a restraining order, if you like, against his harassment. That would make it a criminal offense if he sent another gift." Mr. Crawford's head bobbed slightly, encouraging her to agree. "It's your decision, Starling; you can put an end to it right now."<p>

She shook her head. "I'm committed to seeing it through, sir. He's traded valuable information before - starting the very first time you sent me there. He could do it again."

Mr. Crawford stared at her in silence. She gazed back, uncertain of what, if anything, he was trying to convey. Eventually, he dropped his eyes to his desk and sighed. She waited. He leaned back in his chair and looked at her once more.

"I owe you an apology, Starling. None of this would have happened if I hadn't put you in Lecter's field of vision. I want you to give this some serious thought before you're in too deep. He's a master manipulator, and you're a green agent."

She burned with resentment, needing to look away to compose herself. He was treating her like a child.

"Don't be sorry, sir. Sending me there ultimately saved Catherine Martin's life. It might help us save others, too."

When he dismissed her, it was with strict instructions to keep him apprised of Lecter's every move. That would give them the best chance of developing a strategy to stay ahead of him, or so Mr. Crawford seemed to believe.

It wouldn't be that easy, Clarice thought, recalling the way the doctor had played on her desperation and manipulated her in Memphis. _He'll find a way to outmaneuver Mr. Crawford, too. It's what he does._


	3. Chapter 3

**Aug. 1, 1991**

The drive was empty when Clarice arrived home; for once, she'd beaten Ardelia there. Grabbing the bag of Mexican takeout from the passenger seat, she hopped out and headed toward the porch.

The screen door stood partly open. Clarice quickened her pace. The front door was still closed, she noted. As she mounted the steps, the source of the problem became clear: a box wedged in the space between the door and the screen, just a bit too thick to allow the latter to latch.

She tugged open the screen door, letting the box tip forward onto her foot. Plain brown wrapping. No return address. No postage.

Clarice froze, the breath stilling in her lungs, but underneath that stillness lay a charge of potential energy just waiting for the chance to move. A whisper of memory tickled her ear, and she let it come. Dr. Lecter's voice, and her own.

_How did you feel when you saw him, Clarice?_

_Scared at first... then exhilarated._

She seized the package and tucked it under her arm before unlocking the door and stepping inside. She carried the box and the food to the kitchen, depositing both on the table, and rustled up a plate and a can of Diet Coke.

The box sat in the center of the table while she ate her burritos and drank her Coke and contemplated the doctor's game. When she had finished eating, she tossed the trash, cleaned the plate and left it in the rack to dry, and washed the grease from her hands. No point in donning gloves; she knew who had sent the package, and he'd hardly deny it if asked.

Clarice tore open the paper and slid out the box. Not a shirt box this time, she noted. Her pocketknife easily cut through the tape holding it closed. A cream-colored envelope lay on top, her name elegantly written across the front. She lifted it out with steady hands, hands that could pull a trigger ninety times a minute.

Peering into the box revealed a thin book and - still in their packaging - a CD, personal CD player and thick, cushioned headphones. She turned her attention to the letter.

**Dear Clarice,**

**Our recent conversation has merely solidified my impression of the American educational system as woefully deficient in the classical arts. It's no reflection on you, my dear, as I have little doubt you should find much to enjoy were you to devote yourself to unfamiliar pursuits. **

**To that end, I am enclosing an opera to begin your education, along with the necessary accoutrements to enjoy it. The book contains a summary of the piece as well as the libretto in Italian and English. I must confess I neglected to ask what languages you speak, Clarice. Perhaps you'll enlighten me when next we meet. **

**Are you familiar with **_**Tosca**_**, my dear? It seemed a fitting place to begin. Tell me, Clarice, would you kill an interfering authority figure who attempted to part you from your lover? Make an attempt at an answer, now.**

**Do give my best to Jack and the boys at the lab. **

**I remain,**

**Faithfully yours, **

**Hannibal Lecter, M.D.**

The letter slipped from her fingers and drifted to the table.

"Sonuvabitch."

* * *

><p><strong>Aug. 2, 1991<strong>

"He's not serious, sir."

"And you're certain of that how, Starling? You're good, you've got a fine mind, but your experience is limited."

Jack Crawford leaned against a filing cabinet in his office. Clarice sat in the chair before his desk, resenting the sense it gave her of being an errant schoolgirl called to account.

"He likes to goad people. It's what he does. You know that, sir. And he's bored."

"That's your answer? He's bored?" Mr. Crawford quite obviously wasn't impressed by her hypothesis; his body language screamed skepticism despite the level tone of his voice.

"Dr. Chilton still hasn't returned his books, his papers, his art supplies ... yes, I think he's bored. You can't deny that he's brilliant."

"You make him sound like a kid acting up in class, Starling."

Clarice shrugged; she rather fit that description herself at the moment, she thought.

"So challenge him, sir. Give him something to do." _Give __**me**__ something to do._

Crawford tapped his fingers on the cabinet top.

"I'll think on it. When are you planning to head up there again?"

"Two weeks, sir. Third Saturday of the month."

"Come see me before then, and maybe I'll have something. No guarantees, Starling - and for Chrissake, keep that killer out of your head."

She smiled as she departed. _Too late for that, sir._

* * *

><p><strong>Aug. 17, 1991<strong>

Clarice Starling had a crackling energy about her and a satchel slung over her shoulder when next she came to visit.

The doctor stood to greet her, a gesture that he noted - by the elevated pulse in her neck and the slightest twitch of her lips - pleased her, though he doubted she knew precisely why it did so. Were he able to do so, he would gladly open doors, gesture her to precede him, and seat her with honor. All courtesies due the woman she was. Though her age had not changed, her station had been elevated. She was not a student to tread dutifully in his footsteps but a woman owed every courtesy and respect.

"Clarice. How lovely to see you." He inclined his head. "Please, sit."

"Actually, I have something for you first, Doctor, if you don't mind business before pleasantries." She flipped open the satchel and pulled out a thick file. "If I don't give it to you now, I'll just be distracted while we talk."

She walked over to the sliding tray. "May I?"

"By all means, Clarice." He watched her rather than the tray. Her agitation had increased, not decreased, with the delivery of her pages. He made no move to pick them up. "A new case for us, Clarice? We do make quite the team."

Her head shifted just slightly, a subconscious denial. Surprising; he had thought his soft jab about partnership would be better received.

"Not for us, Doctor."

Ah, not a denial of the idea of them as a team, then, simply a correction to his apparently misspoken pronoun.

"This one's just for you." The word "just" came out with a subtle stress. Clarice had busied herself settling into her chair, following her familiar check for eavesdropping mechanisms. Her face was turned from him, and he carefully considered what had and had not been said.

"So Jack's decided to test me, has he? Tell me, Clarice, has the perpetrator already been caught? Does he, too, reside in a cell somewhere in the American penal system?"

"I'm sure I've said nothing to indicate that that might be the case, Doctor," she replied, her eyes meeting his own with what appeared to be amusement sparkling in their depths. "If you've come to that conclusion, it's entirely on your own."

She leaned back in her seat, her posture open. The energy he had sensed upon her arrival had faded. She was calmer now, unburdened.

Message received, Agent Starling, he thought. _Jack fancies himself a gamesman, sending his crusading little white pawn to challenge the black king. I do hope I'm there to see it when he finally understands your proper place is at my side, Clarice. The confident black queen makes moves of her own, it seems._

"I'll pick up your thoughts on the case on my next visit, Doctor, if that's acceptable. Unless you'd rather get started now?"

The flicker of distress in her tone pleased him greatly. She was loathe to break their routine, clearly.

"Not at all, Clarice. I have been thinking about food recently - the meals served here are, as one might expect, bland and poorly cooked. Tell me, do you have a favorite meal?"

"Dee and I mostly get takeout or delivery, Doctor. Our schedules don't allow a lot of time for cooking, and I wouldn't know how if they did."

Her face expressed a charming mixture of embarrassment and defiance. With careful tutelage, he expected it would be an easy task to encourage her to refine her palate, though he could not do so in person while remaining a guest of the Baltimore asylum.

"A pity. Food preparation is an elegant art."

She blinked and bit her lip.

"You disagree?"

"No, Doctor."

"But you have some thought on the subject. Don't be tedious, Clarice."

"I was just thinking..." She threw him a warning look. "You did ask, Doctor, so don't blame me if the answer's rude."

"Of course not, Clarice."

"I was thinking that in your hands, everything's probably an elegant art - even murder."

He raised an eyebrow at her, momentarily distracted by the pleasant thought of demonstrating other elegant arts. Apparently she had been giving some thought to his hands. A promising beginning.

"That's hardly rude, Clarice. One might even find it a compliment."

"Sure, if one were a serial killer."

"Yes, if. A lovely little word for hiding all manner of things." He winked. "Now, to return to the topic at hand - did you have a favorite meal as a child, Clarice?"

She shifted in her seat. "Not really, Doctor."

"No... no, you wouldn't have, would you? Young family on a tight budget... your favorite meals were always whatever Mommy served on payday, weren't they? When Daddy's paycheck hadn't yet run out and your lunch sack wasn't empty. What did you eat at the end of the month, Clarice, hmm?"

"Tomato soup." Her voice was flat; hardly a ripple of anger passed over her face. _Well done, Clarice. You've gotten better at schooling your expressions._

"Is that the truth, Clarice, or are you stretching it just a bit, as your mother did the soup?"

"Watered tomato soup, sure. Sometimes just ketchup thinned like it was soup, and stale crackers from the church pantry."

"You don't eat tomato soup now, do you, Clarice?"

"No."

"Do you know, red sauce is actually the base for some wonderful soups? You mustn't let outdated modes of thinking limit your choices, Clarice."


	4. Chapter 4

**Sept. 5, 1991**

When Clarice pulled her car up in front of the house after work Thursday and cut the engine, she was surprised to see Ardelia Mapp storm out the screen door, down the porch steps, and across the lawn.

"Clarice Starling, you get your ass outta that car, girl. We are gonna have us some words."

Clarice opened the door and stepped out. "We are?"

"How could you not _tell_ me about the new man in your life?" Ardelia grabbed her elbow and began pulling her toward the house.

"It's news to me, Delia." In the last four months, she'd had precisely one date, with Noble Pilcher, he of the insect lore. In fact, the only man she was seeing on any kind of social level was... _behind bars. Do not freak out, Clarice. Do not freak out._

"This guy is seriously fantastic, Clarice! If you don't want him, can I have him?"

"He's _in the house_?" She couldn't help a panicked glance at the door. _OK, maybe freak out a little. No; ridiculous. Delia would recognize Hannibal Lecter if he knocked on the door. Would he knock? What? Ugh, stop thinking, Clarice, not helping!_

"No, and the guys who set it up left already. Seriously, girl, get in the house. I've been waiting like an hour, and it smells damn delicious."

Delia was right; the smell coming through the screen door was indeed delicious. An elbow nudged her none too gently in the back.

"Get a move on, girl; you're letting flies in."

Clarice stepped inside the house and dropped her purse on the table near the door. Ardelia propelled her into the kitchen, where the table had been draped in an elegant white cloth, and covered silver trays filled every inch of space.

"See, there's even these little menu cards to tell us about each dish and instructions for reheating - which we would have needed if you'd been any longer. Oh, and that." Ardelia pointed at a cream-colored envelope with Clarice's name perfectly centered in familiar handwriting.

Clarice closed her eyes. _If I call Mr. Crawford right now, everything on this table will disappear into the evidence lab and he will rescind his permission for the visits. Chilton won't even let me get a foot in the door after that._

"Sorry, girl, what am I thinking? Here, read your love letter in private - but give a shout before you start eating!" Ardelia pressed the envelope into her hands, squeezed her shoulder, and left the kitchen.

_Think smarter, Clarice. Determine your goal and plan the best route to reach it._

"You would have planned ahead, too, wouldn't you? So let's see what you have to say," she murmured, sliding her fingers under the seal and lifting the letter. The paper felt the same as before, thick and rich under her fingertips. She unfolded it with care.

**Dear Clarice,**

**Must I always greet Jack as well? He's such a nosy uncle. Not to worry, Uncle Jack; I've solved your little puzzle, and my answers will be waiting for Clarice upon her next visit. I do hope you like crayon. Send a more difficult challenge next time, hmm?**

**Clarice, I must apologize for the substitution of paid preparation for the meal before you. I would have preferred to exercise my own hands in such elegant arts, but alas, dear old Freddie denied my request for a fully stocked French kitchen in this dank dungeon. I believe it was the expense of running new lines for the utilities that decided the matter.**

**Nevertheless, I did submit detailed instructions to the staff, and I am satisfied that the preparation will be more than adequate. In case you're wondering - no, you wouldn't, would you? - very well, in case Uncle Jack is wondering, there are no **_**special**_** ingredients included. You and Ms. Mapp are free to indulge without guilt or fear. The servers have been instructed to leave a card, as I'm certain Uncle Jack will wish to interview the staff for his files. **

**I do hope you'll try the soup, Clarice. You have my word: not a drop of ketchup to be found.**

**Yours,**

**Hannibal Lecter, M.D.**

Clarice stared unseeing at the table and chewed on her lip. After a few moments, she tucked the letter back into the envelope and laid it beside the plate.

"C'mon, Delia, I'm starving," she called. "Let's eat!"

* * *

><p><strong>Sept. 6, 1991<strong>

"Have the good sense to show some healthy fear, Starling." Jack Crawford leaned forward in his seat. His finger tapped the letter lying in a plastic sheath on the desk in front of him.

"No, sir. I'm having the good sense to reject boxing myself in that way. If I show fear, I'm accepting the notion that he's a predator and I'm prey. That is _not_ the case."

"He's fixated on you. It's dangerous."

"I can handle it, sir."

"I know you're tough, Starling; you don't have to prove that to me."

"I'm not proving anything, sir. He could be useful; you know he could. And he likes to needle you. I'm not convinced his little 'gifts' have anything to do with me at all." She pushed forward carefully, wary of her verbal footing at this angle. "I've read the file; I know what he did to Will Graham. Repeating himself would bore him. Isn't it more likely that he's just trying to unsettle you by prodding your representative?"

"You think this is a ploy to irritate me?"

"I think Dr. Lecter loves to play games, and I think he has precious few players to keep him occupied these days. If he takes one off the board, he hurts himself as much as he hurts you."

"You still want to keep on with these visits."

"Why not? If I don't go back now, either I've been intimidated by his playful posturing and requested that you not send me there or I've been intimidated by your authority and given in to your demand that I not go. Either way, I've shown weakness and I'm not worth playing with anymore. In that scenario, I definitely move down the list from amusing visitor to prey."

Crawford sighed and rubbed his hand over his face.

"Alright, Starling. This is your play. But you get in over your head, you tell me immediately."

"Of course, sir." Clarice rose from her chair. "I should get back to running down numbers; that's what they're paying me for, after all."

She was nearly out the door before Crawford responded.

"Give it a year or two, Starling. I'll get you the spot you deserve."

She nodded and left. Mr. Crawford would come through; she wanted Behavioral Science so bad she could taste it.

* * *

><p><strong>Sept. 21, 1991<strong>

Clarice Starling was a clever woman with a quick and agile mind. Hannibal Lecter knew this to be fact - and yet she had some gaping blind spots in her thinking, particularly about herself. It was such gaps he blamed for the stunningly incorrect conclusions she had drawn about their interactions.

"- and I'm not impressed with your schoolyard attempts to make me some sort of trophy in the tug-o-war you're playing with Mr. Crawford."

She had yet to sit down. He thought she appeared rather leonine, stalking in front of the glass. Her path never took her beyond the margins of his cell, so that one might, if one wished, imagine that she, too, was bound by its borders.

"And does Jack agree with this assessment of the situation, Clarice?"

"He thinks you're obsessed with me, Doctor."

"Mmm. Perhaps Jack is simply projecting his own obsession." Well, he might be, the doctor allowed, though that didn't preclude him from being correct about the doctor's own interest level. But Clarice Starling's trust was a fragile thing, and admitting the full measure of his intentions now might only serve to unsettle her. Better to direct her thoughts elsewhere, if possible.

"Or perhaps you're both obsessed with each other, Doctor, only Mr. Crawford won't deign to visit you and engage in the game directly. He sends me, and you send mocking little notes to him with your gifts."

"Clarice."

He waited as she reined in her agitation. It was impossible to say whether it bothered her more to be his object of obsession or a symbol of victory in a bout of macho posturing. Care was called for here, so as not to devalue her worth to him - and, simultaneously, so as not to startle her into taking flight.

"Please." He gestured to the chair waiting for her use. She turned to face down the hall and inhaled slowly, exhaling in kind. He watched the play of muscles flexing in her cheek and jawline. _Lovely._

When she had seated herself and faced him once more, he continued.

"I cannot speak to Jack's purpose, Clarice; I am hardly omniscient." He locked his gaze to hers, as open as he dared be, a banked ember of the blaze she woke in him. "But, for my part, you are not now, nor have you ever been, merely an object in a contest of wills."

He held himself still as she studied him - his face, his voice, his posture - letting her look her fill. If he shrouded himself behind a blank face now, he sensed, he would lose her. Youthful impatience and frustration would conspire to cut short their dance.

The moment stretched. A flicker of understanding passed through her like an electrical current and dissipated as he watched. Finally, her lips moved. He felt quite certain he knew the content of her next question.

"Alright, Doctor. I'll take you at your word." Her eyes narrowed; her head tilted slightly to the left. "And I won't ask precisely how you _do_ categorize me, if not as a pawn in your game."

His eyes warmed without conscious intent. Magnificent, he thought. _Surprise is such a rare gift, and yet she hands it to me effortlessly with her trust. _Yes, she had some awareness of his answer, a first blush, as it were, of understanding. Perhaps she recognized her own inability to hear and accept the truth of the matter so early in their acquaintance. Perhaps she, too, didn't wish to end their dance just yet.

"In return, though, I want an equal courtesy extended to me when I ask for it, Doctor. Just once - I'm not seeking unlimited favors here - you'll accept my silence without digging or prodding or mocking. Acceptable?"

He closed his eyes briefly as he nodded, reimposing neutrality upon his features.

"As you wish, Clarice. The bargain is struck."

"Good." She grinned at him then, and his breath caught for just a moment at the impish joy in her expression. "Now that that's settled, I understand you have some love notes about the case that you want me to pass along to Mr. Crawford. I hope you chose brightly colored crayons, Doctor. I'm sure he'll want to hang your work on his office wall."

"I had no idea my work was so highly prized in the halls of the vaunted FBI, Clarice. Shall I color something for your wall as well? I'm afraid the eight-pack of crayons I'm allowed these days provides a limited palette for experimentation, but I might manage a credible tree, or a house, or perhaps even a fire truck with a spotted dog."

Her lips twitched.

"I'm sure your crayon masterpieces would be quite the envy of any kindergartner, Doctor. But you're assuming that I have a wall - or even a permanent desk. As of yet, I have neither."

"Perhaps you'd care to trade accommodations, Clarice. I am able to offer you permanent walls and a recently restored desk as well as a cot for those long nights at the office."

She snorted, eyeing the newly bolted table, chair, and bunk that had finally been returned to his cell.

"I'll think about it, Doctor, but don't hold your breath."

"Of course not, Clarice. Even pearl divers could not hold their breath so long."


	5. Chapter 5

**Oct. 2, 1991**

When Clarice arrived home Wednesday, a man in uniform was standing on her porch.

She sized him up as she got out of the car.

Early 20s, maybe, but short and scrawny enough that he could probably still get into the movies on a child's ticket. Hat and shirt with the logo of a D.C. courier service.

He smiled as she approached, raising his clipboard in greeting.

"Miss Starling? Clarice Starling?"

"You got her. Been waiting long?"

"Not too long. It's nice to catch a break, anyways. This one's an in-person, must-see-ID, signed delivery only. Must be something important."

"Mmm. We'll see." She showed her driver's license, took the clipboard and its attached pen, signed where he indicated, and traded it back to him for a plain brown package about the size of a hardback book. "Thanks."

He gave her a jaunty salute as he departed in a compact car with company decals plastered across its sides.

Clarice carried the package inside, her fingers rubbing lightly against the brown paper wrapping. A familiar mix of anticipation and exhilaration was rising under her skin. She wondered what the doctor would say if she told him that the touch of plain brown paper was now like the brush of his finger to her senses.

As if she'd ever tell him such a thing. _It's beyond inappropriate, Clarice, and you know he's up to something, even if he says it's not needling Mr. Crawford._

She set the package down on the kitchen table in what now seemed a ritual. She circled the table, enjoying the not-knowing. The anticipation felt almost like - _Whoa. Dee's right. I really need to meet a guy._

The package was just a shade too long to be square, about eight inches by ten. Clarice sat down and pulled it to the table's edge, slipping her fingers under the paper at the fold and peeling it back.

The box inside was white, with a shiny gold logo embossed on the cover. Her hands, her steady hands, paused at the sight. She sucked in a breath as she lifted the lid.

The expected cream-colored envelope lay inside. Below it, a black velvet box. Her fingertips tingled as her skin whispered over the surface. She picked up the letter first, not yet ready to face the contents of the box.

**Dear Clarice,**

**Adversity has made you stronger, has it not? Your struggles have pushed you to excel, shaped you in ways you may not yet know.**

**Your existence is layered around an irritant, Clarice, a moment that so pierced your child self that you could think to do nothing but guard against future threats. You grew a thicker skin, an armor reflecting purity and goodness but never allowing others to see within.**

**They don't see it; they cannot see it. But you still feel it, Clarice, that tiny irritant always scratching at you. No armor can keep it out; you've wrapped it too tightly within. A speck of sand buried in an iridescent shell.**

**Is that what Uncle Jack senses when he looks at you, Clarice? I wonder. Tell me, if you know, what it is about you that makes him quake with fear at the thought of placing you on his team.**

**I assure you, Clarice, if I tremble in your presence, it is not fear that drives me.**

**As ever, I remain,**

**Your faithful servant,**

**Hannibal Lecter, M.D.**

**P.S.: Please do tell Jack not to be jealous. He'd look lovely in pearls, don't you agree?**

Clarice laid the letter aside and reached for the velvet case. Opening it was almost anticlimactic, as she already knew what she would find inside. She couldn't deny that the man had excellent taste.

* * *

><p><strong>Oct. 15, 1991<strong>

"You were right about the pearls, Starling." Jack Crawford shook his head as if to negate the conclusion despite the evidence lying on his desk. "Lab x-ray confirmed they're wild, not cultured. The chain's 18-carat gold, in case you were wondering. The jeweler won't give up the invoice without a warrant, but he was willing to 'estimate' a price. We're talking thousands of dollars. Still think he's not obsessed with you?"

Clarice sat up straighter in her chair, leaning slightly forward to emphasize her point.

"I think we don't reckon value the same way."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning Dr. Lecter has plenty of money, and the court's declaration of him as insane rather than guilty still allows him to access it through his lawyer. We already know that's how he's initiating these gifts and authorizing payments."

The legwork resulting from her unofficial little project had been handled through Behavioral Science; Clarice was kept updated through her monthly meetings with Mr. Crawford. He nodded now, impatiently waving her onward to her point.

"And?"

"The money's of no use to him in prison; it's not as though the director would allow him to redecorate his cell, and they'll never let him out, especially not after Memphis. What's the one new thing he's guaranteed to see every month, sir?"

"You."

"Me."

Clarice paused to marshal her argument. Every conversation with Mr. Crawford was a minefield, with her future at stake, and conversations about Dr. Lecter were doubly so. It was odd, she thought, that she would not characterize her discussions with the doctor in the same way, though he was most certainly the more dangerous partner.

"You get a sweater from your aunt at Christmas, and the next time she visits, you wear it, right? Because it's the polite thing to do." Not that she had an aunt to give her sweaters, Clarice allowed, but the metaphor was still apt.

"Dr. Lecter appreciates courtesy, and he knows I know that. So he sends a shirt, and I wear it when I visit. He sends me music, and he peels apart every nuance of my reaction to it. He sends me a meal, and he asks for a description of every dish. Now he sends pearls; he expects me to wear them."

"You think it's not you that has him obsessed." Mr. Crawford spoke slowly, seemingly testing each word against a mental template before pronouncing it.

"Precisely. He likes nice things, sir, things that are pleasing to the eye and the ear and the tongue. I'm just letting him indulge in the only way he can. It's not personal; it's more like... being a store mannequin. Window dressing."

"But his last line - that's personal, Starling."

"Is it?" She couldn't resist deliberately misunderstanding. "Dr. Lecter does have a keen fashion sense. If he says it's so, then I'm sure you _would_ look lovely in the pearls, sir."

"Don't get fresh, Starling; you know the line I mean. He practically comes right out and says he wants you."

Mr. Crawford looked away from her as he spoke, and for the first time, Clarice sincerely wondered if the doctor had been right about him - both about the fear and about the imagined... scenarios.

"Does he? I don't see it that way, sir. You're forgetting a crucial word: 'if'."

The man clearly remained unconvinced; she didn't need the skeptical raised brows and patronizing stare to tell her that.

"Dr. Lecter chooses his words carefully, sir. Very carefully. He's not admitting to anything here. He's hypothesizing."

Mr. Crawford's hand rested atop the evidence bag on his desk. His fingers rippled, tapping against the plastic once, twice, three times before Clarice spoke again.

"I'll need that back if I'm to keep stringing him along." She quashed a guilty twinge, unsure whether it came from lying to Mr. Crawford or mischaracterizing her talks with the doctor. But the doctor would most likely understand, even approve, of the lie. _Not that I need his approval. _"If my theory's right, he'll be expecting to see it."

Her argument was solid; Jack Crawford conceded as much when he handed her back the velvet case and its expensive cargo without further protest. She thanked him and left, projecting confidence around her like the armor the doctor accused her of wearing.

But he was right; the armor couldn't keep out the irritants already inside. In this case, it was merely something the doctor had said back in August. She ducked into the bathroom and stared at herself in the mirror until it came to her.  
><em><br>Yes, if. A lovely little word for hiding all manner of things._

"Just what _are _you hiding, Doctor?"

The mirror had no answer.

* * *

><p><strong>Oct. 19, 1991<strong>

The doctor could smell her even before he could see her. She had never carried the scents of the outside world so strongly. It was difficult, he supposed, to smell intensely of sunshine and summer breezes. But autumn... autumn had weight and richness.

The reason was immediately apparent when she stepped into view: gray, ankle-length, lightweight and thin but clearly waterproof, as tiny droplets had beaded up on the collar and shoulders.

"You didn't leave your coat in the office today, Clarice."

She shrugged, and some of the droplets began a slow slide off her shoulders.

"You like new stimuli, Doctor. It occurred to me that I've been depriving you of another source."

He inhaled, deeply, scenting the layered nuances of coat and woman.

"It's raining today, not heavily, though I need only my eyes to tell you that, Clarice. And you've been... burning leaves?" A pleasant smoky fragrance clung to the fabric, but faintly. "Last week, perhaps." He paused, considering whether to continue, before adding, "You showered this morning with an almond-scented cleanser."

If she was at all startled or discomfited, she gave no sign. Indeed, her gaze softened and she gave a slight nod as though his answers confirmed a question she hadn't even asked.

"Very good, Doctor. Right on all counts. Dee dragged me to a harvest-themed party last Saturday, and yes, there were leaves in the fire pit."

"It must have been a chilly night if you needed your long coat, Clarice."

"A bit." Her fingers moved nimbly over the belt and the buttons before she turned around and shrugged out of the coat, draping it over the back of the familiar metal chair he'd come to consider hers. The bottom formed a gray puddle on the floor.

He recognized her shirt instantly; she was wearing the graduation gift he'd sent. She'd paired the deep purple blouse with steely gray wool slacks and low-heeled black boots. Her calves flexed enticingly against the slacks as she turned back to face him and stepped forward.

He allowed his eyes to linger, trailing appreciatively over the flare of her hips, the dip of her waist, the drape of the cotton over her breasts, the modest flash of skin in the vee where her top button was undone, and... yes, the necklace he'd sent, two gunmetal gray, perfectly round, natural black pearls dropped on a single line from a gold chain.

The pearls lay at the base of her throat, cradled in her suprasternal notch. The light moving over them as she swallowed gave the pearls a faint purple sheen. He was quite pleased with his choice. Selecting them sight unseen, describing the details to his lawyer to be repeated to the jeweler, was a distasteful nuisance that could only be endured.

"The pearls are a lovely gift, Doctor. Extravagant, but lovely." She moved even closer, stopping a mere handspan from the glass. He mirrored her action. Less than a foot separated them now, only inches, but those inches encompassed an impenetrable barrier. A flicker of frustration accompanied the desire to reach out and stroke the smooth skin of her neck.

"You've paired them well, Clarice, matching the colors with your ensemble. For my benefit?"

"You wouldn't be sending me things to wear if you didn't want to see them." She was watching him closely, seeking a reaction perhaps. "And wearing them isn't exactly a hardship, Doctor."

There was no blink, no widening of the eyes to give him away; he maintained perfect control in the moment he understood her game. _She's testing a theory. Very well, Clarice, let's see how committed you are to the rationalization you've come up with this time, hmm?  
><em>  
>"If I didn't want to see <em>them<em>, Clarice? Are you so certain it is the gifts, and not your charming self, that I wish to see?"

Her eyes narrowed. "You sound like Mr. Crawford."

"Uncle Jack may not play at our level, Clarice, but he's not entirely obtuse, either. Have you considered that he may be correct?"

"Our level, Doctor? That's quite a leap, isn't it? What happened to 'fly back to school, little Starling'?"

"And so you did, Clarice. But your schooldays are behind you now. Recess, too, must evolve."

"I don't think I'm playing at your level, Doctor." And now he had discomfited her, as he had not before with his sensory appreciation. He watched as her gaze dropped briefly to her shoes and her weight shifted.

"But you could, Clarice."

His words only added to the tension in her muscles. Would she bolt? He could watch her, goad her, spar with her on any number of subjects - but the slightest hint that she might be his match still provoked immediate rejection from her.

"Why did you send me the necklace, Doctor?"

"You know why, Clarice. It is made of rare and precious elements, grown wild, shaped beautifully, dark and shining. Rather like its wearer." He leaned forward, as though sharing a secret. "I sent it to you, Clarice, because it pleased me to do so."

She was quite still. Such stillness was unnatural in his fledgling; he had cultivated it in himself, but she was a creature of movement and action, of youthful energy. He waited long moments, but her face never changed, never reflected the thoughts that surely careered inside her mind. _Where have you gone, Clarice, hmm?_

Her gaze remained blank, but her left hand lifted to her throat, two fingers resting lightly on the lower pearl. She blinked, then, and spoke.

"It's a shame I haven't anywhere to wear them, Doctor."

He allowed the diversion, gratified that although she had not acknowledged his admission, she had not retreated. His Clarice was a warrior. She might gather more information and test more theories before she was willing to come to terms, but she would not leave the field of battle.

He could not yet see the path forward, could not yet estimate its length, but each step brought him closer to his goal.


	6. Chapter 6

**Author's note: **My apologies for the lengthy posting delay; the East Coast snowstorm knocked out power to my house several days ago and it's likely to be a few more before it's back on. This update is courtesy of the free wi-fi at the local community center. To those who have reviewed in the interim, thank you, and I'll respond when I have more time.

* * *

><p><strong>Nov. 3, 1991<strong>

Clarice shifted uneasily in her seat - ninth row, center, far enough back to be elevated slightly above the stage - and brushed her fingers against the pearls at her throat. She was glad the doctor had chosen an afternoon performance; her best slacks and blouse didn't look out of place in the crowd, though she still felt as though she were sneaking in somewhere she shouldn't. Starlings did not go to the symphony.

The seat to her right remained empty. A discreet glance at her watch showed the performance was just a few minutes away. She began to suspect he had purchased two tickets, though there'd been only one in the envelope with his letter. Her fingers smoothed down the nap on the armrest they shared.

"Waiting for your husband, dear?" Clarice turned her head toward the voice; the older woman, white hair perfectly coiffed, had already been sitting in the seat to her left when she had arrived. Thus far, they had exchanged no more than civil nods of greeting.

"My James was the same way, always arriving at just the last moment. He passed on, oh, thirteen years ago, now, but sometimes I still expect to see him when I look to my right."

"I'm sorry for your loss, ma'am. But no, I'm not waiting for anyone."

"Oh, he couldn't make it? Good for you, though, coming on your own."

"No, ma'am, I mean I'm not married."

The woman's hand was baby soft as it lightly squeezed Clarice's arm just above her watchband.

"Oh, dear, I'm sorry. Where are my manners? I forget that you young people these days don't always tie the knot. What's the term? Partner? Companion? Boyfriend?"

Clarice wondered briefly if calling him her boyfriend would be enough to startle a laugh out of the doctor. "No, no, he's definitely not a boy, though he can be boyishly playful at times."

The woman laughed and patted Clarice's arm before pulling back her hand.

"It's invigorating, isn't it? My James and I raised three boys, mischief-makers, every one. There were whole years when I despaired of ever civilizing them."

Clarice smiled to hide the panic fluttering about in her head. _I just tacitly called Hannibal Lecter my boyfriend. No, it was just a polite lie. I can hardly explain the situation to some stranger at the symphony._

"It must have been quite the adventure." Clarice distracted herself by practicing her witness interrogation skills, subtly guiding the woman - Grace, she learned - with questions that kept the spotlight firmly on James and the boys and away from Hannibal Lecter.

The lights flickered; the musicians tuned their instruments.

"You're a sweet girl to let me chatter so," Grace concluded. "Don't worry, dear, I'll let you enjoy the concert in peace. You'll have to tell your young man all about it, hmm?"

Clarice's smile was genuine this time. "Yes, he'll be expecting a thorough account."

She settled back in her seat, finally relaxed, the words of his brief letter whispering in her ear as though he occupied the empty seat beside her.

**Dear Clarice,**

**It would be a shame for beauty to go unappreciated. Enjoy the symphony. And, Clarice? Wear the pearls. **

**Yours,**

**Hannibal Lecter, M.D.**

* * *

><p><strong>Nov. 16, 1991<strong>

"Did you enjoy the symphony, Clarice?" He waited politely while she removed her coat and seated herself. "The cello soloist has an excellent reputation, though I myself have not heard him in person."

She met his eyes with her own, a smile playing at her lips. "Was the empty seat next to mine for you, Doctor?"

She was quick; he hadn't been certain she would have made the connection.

"Are we back to playing games, Clarice?"

"Answer my question and I'll answer yours, Doctor."  
><em><br>Mmm. Clarice, have you any idea how lovely you look when you won't back down?_

"I was not able to make use of it, of course, but yes, that was the intent." He frowned, just slightly, and knew she had noticed. "It's simply not done, sending a young lady unescorted. I hope you'll forgive the lapse, Clarice. Had I been able to accompany you, I would have done so."

"Had you been able to accompany me, Doctor, you'd also be able to attend concerts anywhere in the world you liked and you wouldn't need to send me at all."

The blind spot persisted, he noted. Perhaps deliberately so. Very well; this game could move only at the pace she allowed. If she was skittish, it was no wonder; his suit was a rather unconventional one, given that she must go on their dates alone.

"True, my dear, but then I would be denying myself the pleasure of your company." He continued briskly onward, not allowing her room to protest. "Now then, the concert. You enjoyed it?"

"Very much so. The music was wonderful, and the acoustics were amazing. It was a far cry from a high school gymnasium."

His head tilted in silent inquiry.

"Student concerts. It's the closest I've been to the symphony until now. The music is much better when the room doesn't smell of sweaty teenagers."

"I realize it's not Paris or Florence, but surely Bozeman had some cultural opportunities beyond the high school, Clarice."

"I'm sure it did, Doctor, but the Lutheran Home couldn't afford such extravagance, not with so many children needing the basics first. I remember... oh, it must have been sixth or seventh grade, the whole middle school had a field trip to the ballet planned. _The Nutcracker_. It was an optional outing; the Home opted not to pay, so the nine of us sat in study hall all afternoon until the buses came back."

"Culture is hardly an extravagance, Clarice. It is as necessary to the human condition as breathing."

Clarice looked at the still-bare walls of his cell. He saw her hesitation, saw her push past it.

"Are you suffocating, Doctor?"

"I have my memories to sustain me, Clarice."

"That's not a 'no,' Doctor."

"Are you familiar with the medieval method of torture known as pressing, Clarice? The accused would be stretched out upon the ground as rocks were placed upon his chest until he could no longer draw breath."

"Compressive asphyxia."

He inclined his head, pleased with her clinical understanding.

"Each breath is shallower than the last; the knowledge of one's death in restricted circumstances is inescapable. I tell you this not to invite pity, Clarice, but so that you might better understand my point."

She was considering his words, her brow furrowed, one corner of her lower lip moving slightly as she tugged it under her teeth and released it. He mentally captured the image for sketching later, after his materials had been returned; Clarice deserved far more care than dull crayons could supply.

"You drew the scene in Florence from memory. With all that detail. All of your memories are that exact, Doctor? You could... see them... revisit them? Every cultural event... every night at the symphony or the opera or the ballet."

He shifted his weight as she paused, and she held up a finger in a distracted request for a moment more of silence. The presumption amused him all the more for her complete lack of hesitation. _Have a care, Clarice. You've grown accustomed to the very comfort in my presence you struggle so mightily against. I await the day you finally allow yourself to realize it._

"But in here... in here you have nothing to add to your store of memories. No new experiences, except through me. Even someone with your diverse interests, your years of culture-rich experiences... it would grow tiresome, always hearing the same performances. It would be..."

She trailed off, meeting his eyes with painfully shared understanding.

"Suffocating."

* * *

><p><strong>Dec. 3, 1991<strong>

"Thanks for accepting the package, Dee." Clarice, standing in the kitchen, laid one hand on the back of a chair for balance and pulled her ankle behind her back with the other. "I hate stakeouts. Twelve hours in a cramped car with Buckley could turn any woman into a man-hating lesbian."

"You going to open it or just caress it with your eyes, girlfriend?" Ardelia Mapp sat down at the table across from Clarice and tapped her finger against the box's brown paper wrapping. Clarice suppressed the urge to pull it closer to her side of the table. "And when am I going to meet this mystery man? He's been sending gifts for months, but you never talk about him."

Something was off. Ardelia's voice was a little too practiced, a little overly casual. _She knows._

"If there's something you want to ask me, Dee-"

"You sure there's not something you want to _tell_ me first, Clarice?"

Clarice let her foot drop to the floor and gripped the chair back with both hands, staring down at her knuckles. She did not want to have this conversation. She'd been avoiding it for far too long, and she knew she would pay for her procrastination now. Resigned to her fate, she asked the obvious question.

"How'd you find out?"

"_That's_ what you want to say to me? Not, 'Dee, I'm sorry that I haven't told you a cannibalistic serial killer is sending me love notes'? Not, 'Dee, I'm sorry I didn't say anything months ago _before I let you eat the food he sent'_?" Her hand slapped the table. "I ate that food, Clarice, and you didn't say a word! Tell me this is some undercover thing for Crawford. Tell me you were sworn to secrecy. Tell me it's the only way you'll get the Behavioral Science slot. But Jesus, Clarice, tell me something. Don't leave me in the dark for months and then pretend like you've done nothing wrong."

"You knew I went to see him after graduation."

"Yeah, and I thought that was the end of it. Wait. You're still going there? What the hell, Clarice?"

"Mr. Crawford knows, Dee. It's not like I'm just visiting for kicks."

"So this _is_ some project that you can't talk about?"

"It's... complicated. Sort of like coaxing a reluctant witness. His insights could be valuable for the BSU, but only if he's willing to work with them."

A twinge of shame bloomed in her chest. Could she really reduce their exchanges to nothing more than making him perform on cue like a trained dog? That wasn't fair to either of them, and she hated saying the words, hated even more saying them to Delia, in whom she should have been able to confide. Nausea threatened, and the thought of dinner suddenly lost its appeal.

"And he only talks to you," Ardelia said, head nodding in comprehension. "Okay, I get that. But why didn't you tell me? I'm not just anybody, Clarice. We're roomies. I felt like a complete idiot when I walked into the document lab to check on some papers for a fraud case and saw the envelope with your name on it."

"You saw... when was this, Dee?"

"Weeks ago. I've been waiting for you to tell me, but no matter how I tried to bring up the letters, you wouldn't say 'boo' about them. He's the reason you went to the symphony? He sent you the pearls?"

Thank god; if she had only seen the brief note the doctor had sent with the symphony ticket, she hadn't seen anything too damaging.

Clarice pulled out the chair and sat down.

"Yeah, he sent the symphony ticket and the pearls."

"Are you in danger, Clarice? Is he stalking you? Does Crawford know about the gifts? He must, right, if the lab's investigating them?"

"He knows, Dee. It's fine; there's no danger. I swear to you, I wouldn't put you in any danger."

Ardelia stared hard across the table at her. Clarice kept her face carefully blank.

"I know you want this assignment bad, Clarice, but is it really worth it? Spending all this time talking with psychopaths and killers, learning to think like them?" Ardelia shuddered. "You sure you wouldn't rather try white collar?"

Clarice smiled and shook her head.

"I'm sure, Dee. I know it sounds crazy. I know it's not what you would do."

"Okay. Okay. But you keep me informed from now on, you got it? No more of this hiding bullshit."

"Right. No more hiding." Clarice stared at the box sitting between them on the table. Ardelia's gaze followed hers.

"What do you think he sent this time?"

"Given his track record and the size of the box, I'm going to say something to wear." She paused for a moment. "And maybe somewhere to wear it."


	7. Chapter 7

**Author's note: **Again, please accept my apologies for the delay in posting. I'm finally able to access the Internet from home again and - presuming Mother Nature has no further plans to interfere - will resume posting with more speed. Thank you all for your patience and your well-wishes.

* * *

><p><strong>Dec. 21, 1991<strong>

"Did you like the dress, Clarice?" She wasn't wearing it today; no, she had dressed casually, in the ubiquitous denim trousers of the world's youth and a cable-knit sweater with a high collar, though he could occasionally see a glint of gold at her neck that proved the pearls, at least, were still in favor.

"It was like wearing a mercury waterfall, Doctor." Her voice seemed almost girlishly wistful. For just a moment, he allowed himself to yearn for the sight of her wearing it. She must have looked delicious in the floor-length gown, shimmering gray with keyhole sides just above her hips. Just where his hand might rest as she stood beside him. He blinked, and the vision disappeared, with her hopefully none the wiser.

"I felt a bit like Cinderella at the ball." She laughed, at herself, at her fanciful thoughts, he expected. "Nonsense, of course. The hired car was a nice touch, Doctor. I'm not sure I could have driven myself in that dress and those heels."

"Of course, Clarice. One tries to anticipate such things."

"And the ballet was wonderful. I don't think I would have had the patience to appreciate it as a child, but seeing it for the first time as an adult was magical. Thank you for thinking of it."

"You're quite welcome, my dear. I could hardly let another year pass without your having experienced such a holiday tradition."

Her face lifted - in surprise, he judged.

"Do you celebrate Christmas, Doctor?"

Coldness flowed over him in a wave; from a distance, he heard himself answering her automatically.

"Not for many years now, Clarice."

"Me neither. The Lutheran Home did, of course, but it was really only a big deal for the little kids. Before that, though... my father would go out with a couple of his friends and they'd cut the trees and haul them home." She smiled at the memory, and the doctor's eyes fastened on her lips, imagining the warmth of her breath melting the chill that gripped him. "And Momma would make hot chocolate on the stove with a candy cane for stirring while we decorated the tree."

She paused to take a deeper breath, and he knew the precise words that would leave her lips once she had collected her courage.

"What about your family, Doctor? How did you celebrate Christmas when you were a child?"

She sought to humanize him, to compare his experiences with her own and find some commonality. It was her first unprompted attempt to do so; he could not afford to reject it, no matter how much opening the door to those memories would cost him. Once snubbed, she would not ask again, he knew. He searched his mind for something suitable.

"I'm sorry, Doctor; I don't mean to pry." His pause had been too long; he would have to be quick to halt her backpedaling. "It's none of my-"

"Hush, Clarice." He would not normally interrupt her; he was careful, now, to keep his voice low and intimate, cajoling rather than reprimanding. "I am merely gathering my thoughts."

Her lips moved in a soundless "oh" as she relaxed once more in her seat.

"On the morning of the winter solstice - how fitting, Clarice, that today should also be such a day - I went with my father to select an appropriate tree. It was the responsibility of the man of the house, he informed me, and should someday become _my _responsibility, and thus he instructed me in a great many details of shape, and size, and the spread and fullness of branches."

Her body had shifted forward as he spoke; she sat listening with rapt attention like a child at the fireside. He smiled, faintly, at her eager attention.

"I was not then the self-possessed man I am now, Clarice. Hard as it may be for you to believe, I daresay I spent a good deal of the morning playing in the snow and paying little heed to my father's lesson.

"The tree was installed in the house before dusk, and solstice night was spent in decoration, lights blazing to ward off the long, dark night. I nodded off under the tree long before morning."

Her eyes half-closed, and he expected she was trying to picture him in miniature, his head pillowed on his arm, lying beneath the sheltering boughs of the fir tree.

"The next few days were a rush of preparations. Christmas Eve was for feasting. Christmas Day was for merrymaking. My mother..." He faltered for a moment, firmly closing the door against other, darker memories.

"It's alright, Doctor." Clarice's voice was as hushed as his own had been, her tone soft and sweet and comforting. She could have goaded him instead, as he had done to her in the past; she could have pounced on his weakness, demanded his worst memories with a terrible ferocity, attempted to tear open his wounds and savage him, but she did not. Why not? He did not know.

In a single moment of clarity, he wished desperately to hear her speak his name rather than his title, to hear her whispered drawl embrace the syllables of _Hannibal_.

"You don't have to..." She fell silent, watching him as he watched her.

She knew nothing of his early life, he knew, because the FBI knew nothing of his early life. He had given her no details that would increase that knowledge; half the world had a chance for snow at Christmastime. Many of her colleagues might be surprised by the knowledge that he had, indeed, had parents once upon a time, rather than being spawned from Lucifer himself as was Athena from Zeus, but only if she chose to share. From her expression, he rather thought she would not.

"My mother," he continued, having regained his composure, "played the piano and sang. She had a lovely voice and long, elegant fingers that moved like a butterfly's wings across the keys. I can picture her now, Clarice, sitting beside me on the bench, playing carols and singing in a rich mezzo-soprano. I can smell the clean scent of her hand cream, the sharpness of the fir tree, the sweetness of the baked goods on the table. I can feel the smooth, cool touch of the keys beneath my hands as I struggle to reach for the notes with fingers that haven't yet attained their full growth."

He stopped, then, and saw in her face that he had gained much more than the interlude had cost him. Her eyes shone, glassy with unshed tears and something harder to define. Determination, perhaps. Resolution.

"Thank you, Clarice."

"Me, Doctor?" She shook her head. "I should be thanking you."

"It's been many, many years since I last visited those memories, Clarice. Your innocent query returned something precious to me, and I thank you for it."

She had no response to that, he saw, and he changed the subject rather than make her feel uncomfortable with his gratitude.

"I notice your bag seemed heavier than usual today, Clarice. Have you taken to toting bricks about?"

She smiled, shook her head, and raised a finger, bidding him to wait. Slipping from the chair, she knelt on the floor and rummaged through her purse, emerging with a small music player with attached speakers.

"I thought since you couldn't come to the performance, I'd bring the performance to you. I know a boombox is hardly the same, but I'm not much of a dancer, Doctor, so the music is all you get."

"That's quite thoughtful of you, Clarice." Her concern for him, for his mental well-being and cultural isolation, was a pleasant sign of progress. It was more than courtesy; surely she knew that.

She dropped the cassette tape into its slot and pushed it closed, pressing a button to start the playback. She fiddled with the volume for a moment as the overture began, glancing down the hall, and finally moved forward to sit with her left side leaning against his cell, the music player placed on the chair facing them both. Intrigued by her casual closeness, he lowered himself to the floor and cautiously mirrored her pose, wary of startling her. When she moved, it was only to tilt her head against the glass. Were the barrier absent, she would be resting on his shoulder.

They listened together in silence until the lights in the doctor's cell flickered twice, Barney's signal to Clarice that visiting hours were ending, and she stood to gather her things.

"Merry Christmas, Doctor." Her voice was strained, either from the silence or from an emotion he could not name. Her fingers twitched, and she pressed them flat against her denim-clad outer thigh. Emotion, then. He hadn't had such a wealth of gifts since he was very, very young.

"Merry Christmas, Clarice." He bowed his head, closing his eyes to focus solely on the sound of her footsteps as she departed. He remained so long after even the echoes had fallen silent.


	8. Chapter 8

**Dec. 24, 1991**

Clarice Starling sat curled in her armchair on Christmas Eve morning and stared at the Christmas present lying open on the coffee table. The house was quiet; Ardelia had gone to visit relatives for the holiday, visibly relieved when Clarice had turned down an offer to accompany her. The atmosphere had been strained in the three weeks since she had discovered the truth about the so-called new man in Clarice's life. More work was needed to repair the bonds of friendship and trust.

The gift was from Clarice to herself; she had braved the nightmare of last-minute throngs of shoppers yesterday to purchase it. The urge had been too strong to wait.

She refused to consider why it was that hearing Dr. Lecter's recounting of his mother's piano playing had prompted her to once again take up the violin. But the resolution had burned into her like a brand as the intensity of his remembrance had scalded her heart.

Reading his case file, with the attempted profiles from assorted experts in psychiatry and law enforcement, had made him an abstraction without an origin. Hearing the words from his lips was something else. He had been a child in some ways like every other child, trailing after his father, seeking closeness and comfort from his mother.

"We aren't so different, Doctor," she murmured to the gleaming wood waiting for her touch.

She froze then, her brain stuttering to a stop. _Did I just - no, we are not thinking about this, Clarice. We. Are. Not._

She stumbled up from the armchair and headed outside to go for a run, pausing only to shove her feet into the sneakers, laces still tied, lying beside the door.

An hour passed in a blink. When Clarice finally noticed her surroundings, she was thankful to note that her body had naturally dropped into its long-run rhythm. She knew where she was on her wide neighborhood loop; she knew she'd traveled about nine miles and was now just three miles from home.

She could do that in under twenty-five minutes easy, under eighteen if she pushed it. That was good, because her gloveless hands weren't feeling the chill, and the sign at the bank on the corner ahead was telling her it was just over thirty degrees outside.

_Smart, Clarice. Really fucking smart to go running in the middle of winter without a coat or a hat or gloves or even warmly layered clothes, for crying out loud._ She became uncomfortably aware of the wet T-shirt chilling against her skin beneath her sweatshirt and upped her pace. _But it worked, didn't it? You stopped thinking for an hour. That was worth the pins and needles you'll get when your fingers start warming up._

It was, she thought, but it wasn't worth frostbite. She tugged her sleeves down over her hands and finished her run, forcing herself to slow a bit in the last mile, knowing her muscles wouldn't thank her for dropping from a flat-out run to a dead stop any more than her skin would thank her for the frostbite. It was a relief to get in the front door, though she was frankly disgusted with herself for leaving it unlocked.

_At least you didn't leave it swinging open._

Well, there was that. Still, she made herself check every room before she allowed herself the luxury of a hot shower.

Once she was warm and dry, bundled in her thickest pajamas and two pairs of socks, she was able to return to the living room with something approaching calm.

The violin lay quietly in its case as she had left it. The clerk had been happy to give her a tuning demonstration, to recommend practice books and even a teacher, the woman who gave his son lessons. Musical instruments, it seemed, were not big sellers two days before Christmas, and the store hadn't been mobbed like those around it.

It had been nearly a decade since Clarice had last played. Her instrument hadn't been hers, then; it had belonged to the retired music teacher who donated her time to the Lutheran Home. Weekly lessons for five years, the first two sharing the violin with a more senior student who had already been in training when Clarice had arrived.

She could have said something, mentioned it when the doctor had talked about cultural opportunities. She didn't know what had prompted her to mention the ballet instead, turning the talk away from high school gyms and fumble-fingered teenagers and Clarice Starling, second chair violin in the orchestra.

But now... now she was glad for it, both because it had eventually led to the discussion of Christmas traditions that had made Hannibal Lecter - _Hannibal Lecter, of all people _- share something of his childhood with her and because she now had the means to surprise him with a _fait accompli_. So long as she could keep him from guessing that she was hiding something from him.

That would be the real trick. She would have to relearn quickly or risk giving up the game. The teacher's number was written on the practice book she'd purchased; she would call tomorrow. No, tomorrow was Christmas; she would call the following day and set up lessons as soon as possible.

But there was no time like the present for getting started. She lifted the bow first. It felt unfamiliar in her grip. Her left hand curled around the neck of the violin, but that wasn't quite right either. She stood, placing her left foot slightly in front, but the muscle memory just wasn't clicking, and she loosed a frustrated growl. She was a jumble of uncoordinated limbs and half-remembered postures.

Finally she resorted to closing her eyes and picturing the choir loft where she had often gone to practice. _If he can remember vivid detail, so can you. Just breathe, that's right, you remember ... faded red carpet in the aisle, scratched and dinged wooden pews, the black metal stand with the silver smudge where the touch of too many fingers had rubbed off the finish, the smell of Pine-Sol lingering in the air._

That was better. That felt more natural. Her fingers on the neck had shifted into a cupped position, her grip on the bow loosened, her head tilted just so. Fingers hovering, not touching the strings, she pulled the bow across her body. Yes, that was right. She exhaled slowly, lowered the bow to the strings, and played. The smooth, sweet sound of an open A filled the room.

Guided by memory and her new practice book, she played until her arms grew tired and her neck was sore. In her dreams that night, she stood beside a piano and played duets with a man whose fingers flowed over the keys like water.

* * *

><p><strong>Dec. 25-31, 1991<strong>

Christmas passed without a gift from the doctor. Clarice ruthlessly chased down the kernel of disappointment in her gut and quashed it. The memories he had shared with her and the untroubled dreams she had enjoyed on Christmas Eve were gift enough.

Ardelia returned a day later, in high spirits after her visit home, and their first evening together was a pleasant one. The currents of anger and distrust washed away as Dee told stories and pushed more goodies from her cooler full of leftovers on Clarice than she could possibly eat. Clarice, in return, revealed the violin she had purchased and gave an impromptu concert consisting of scales and childish tunes. Delia, laughing, provided vocal accompaniment for a very slow version of _Row, Row, Row Your Boat _- slow enough that they jokingly agreed the boat would have floated out to sea long before the occupants could bring it to shore.

Clarice arranged for violin lessons on Sunday afternoons and took to practicing most evenings, eager to regain the skills she had lost and pick up new ones. When she went running now, it was classical music in her Walkman as often as rock.

The week between Christmas and New Year's Eve was a blur of violin practice, extra work to cover for more senior agents who'd taken vacation days, and long, easy runs to calm the thoughts she didn't want pressing on her mind.

It was nearly 11 p.m. on New Year's Eve when the knock came at the door. It wasn't Ardelia, she knew; her roommate had gone out partying with her boyfriend of the moment - tall, slender Luther, whose friends had thrown the leaf-burning party in October - and she didn't expect her back at all tonight.

Clarice slid her gun out of its holster and carried it with her. Looking out the thin window beside the door, she flipped on the porch light. A man holding a box wrapped in plain brown paper stepped back from the door into view.

She laid the gun on the side table, still within easy reach, and opened the door.

"Miss Starling?"

She nodded. "Bit late for a delivery."

The man gave a nervous smile. "My apologies, but the customer's instructions were quite specific."

"He's particular like that." Clarice pushed open the screen and accepted the box. It was heavier than she expected.

"Have a happy New Year, miss."

"You too." She closed the door against the chill and turned off the porch light, returning her gun to the holster before taking the box into the kitchen. Her fingers tingled.

The ritual of unwrapping and opening revealed a bottle of wine, two glasses, a corkscrew, and the doctor's letter.

**Dear Clarice,**

**You are home at this hour, are you not? It is presumptuous of me, I know, but I imagine this letter finds you awaiting the approaching new year with the same singular determination you apply to every facet of your life.**

**Do you find yourself reflecting upon the lessons of the previous year, Clarice? Do you tote up your gains and losses and calculate the sum? Does the score please your dead father, do you think? That is what you wonder when the darkness falls and sleep will not come, is it not?**

**Calm yourself, Clarice. Open the wine; it needs time to breathe before its flavor will reach its peak. Just a few minutes, mind; pour yourself a glass and let it sit. You wouldn't allow a fit of pique to ruin a lovely vintage, would you?**

Clarice set the letter down with exacting precision, smoothing the slight crease where her fingers had gripped too tightly.

"Just can't resist showing off, can you, Doctor?"

But she opened the wine and poured a glass before picking up the letter again.

**Thank you, Clarice. Your ability to set aside emotion when a task must be completed has served you well for many years, I suspect. But do you feel the shards such actions leave behind? Do you know how they cut you still? I think you do.**

**Consider, Clarice, that this night is traditionally one for releasing the weight of the previous year and looking ahead to the promise of the next. You'll note that two glasses arrived with your wine. As I cannot share it with you, I would ask a favor.**

**Break the extra glass, Clarice. Pour the troubles of the past inside and shatter it far from your lovely self. Rid yourself of the weight of others' expectations. And when you sit down with the remaining glass, sip slowly. Consider your future. Perhaps next year we'll drink together, hmm?**

**Faithfully yours,**

**Hannibal Lecter, M.D.**

Clarice gazed into the empty glass.

"Just like that, Doctor?"

She thought of her father. He would have wanted her to be happy, and serving justice made her happy, didn't it? Why would she want to let go of that expectation?

_Does it really? Are you happy now, Clarice?_

She frowned. Maybe "happy" wasn't the right word. Work was… frustrating. Boring. Endless. And it never seemed to make a difference.

_That's not true. It made a difference to Catherine Martin. _

Was that enough?

"I guess I have more to think about than I thought."

Clarice raised her glass in a toast. "Happy New Year, Doctor."


	9. Chapter 9

**Jan. 16, 1992**

Special Agent Clarice Starling held her gun low, finger brushing the trigger guard as she moved in step with her team. She was third in their group of four, with Brigham on point and two others hand-picked by him rounding them out.

Adrenaline coursed through her, the same exhilaration she'd once felt upon discovering a head in a jar. Eight months into her tenure at the Bureau and she was doing real work now, not pushing papers. This drug raid would shut down a significant East Coast operation, slowing the flow of cocaine into D.C. schools and neighborhoods.

Better still, her former weapons instructor had asked for her specifically – plucked her from the sea of other faceless academy grads doing legwork – because of her ability to handle herself in a crisis, because of her speedy trigger pull and her precise aim. She had distinguished herself in her courses and on the Buffalo Bill case, and it was paying off now.

Their team was destined for target three, a warehouse where the cocaine was received and repacked for distribution to small-time dealers. The operation was too large for DEA to handle on its own, so the FBI was lending a hand. Brigham was leading one of three teams converging on the warehouse. A fourth team hung back, covering their approaches. The walkies were silent now, as the teams headed to their entry points.

The team split to either side of a pair of metal doors. At Brigham's nod, Jamison, their fourth man, cut the chain around the handles, catching the links before they could make a sound. He set the chain aside, stowed the cutters, and nodded his readiness. Carnahan, their second man, gripped one handle, and Clarice took the other. They waited in silence.

Finally, the radio squawked once. "Go."

She opened the door. Brigham rushed in, Clarice smoothly following behind. Beside them, Jamison and Carnahan did the same. Clarice swiveled to check the corner. Clear. Her heart raced.

They moved forward swiftly, past pallets of product waiting to be cut. Intel reports would have them coming out into the main packing room along the south wall. Intel reports were wrong.

Jamison was the first to turn the corner, knees bent, gun raised. Clarice didn't see the bullet enter, but it was hard to miss the back of his head exploding as it exited. And it was impossible to miss the burning pain as its trajectory intersected with her left bicep. Her head hit the wall as she stumbled, and then Brigham's hand was on her right arm, shoving her back along the path they'd taken.

Gunfire followed them, bullets penetrating the wall above their heads.

"Fuck! Carnahan, take point. Starling, you're in the middle. Move, move, move!" Brigham thumbed his walkie. "Team 2, man down, taking fire."

The maze of pallets was suddenly more dangerous. A flash of movement down the aisle to her right and Clarice fired. Two shots. A body falling, gun pinwheeling to the ground. Behind her, Brigham was shooting at something.

A shadow moved over Carnahan's back. Clarice swiveled her head up, her gun following, and fired at the figure atop the pallet ahead and to her right. His body rolled over the edge, skull striking the concrete floor with a crack. She'd spent too long watching; a bullet slammed into her ribs on the left. Her vest stopped it, but it still hurt like hell. She sucked in a breath and returned fire. Carnahan, still in front of her, was doing the same, at least until he took a bullet in the throat. Then he was sinking to the floor, gurgling as blood poured down his chest.

The shooter leaned out too far to take his next shot, and Clarice drilled him in the chest. His face showed surprise as he fell. His skin was smooth. Beardless. Baby face, she thought.

She glanced back at Brigham just as he looked forward, the sweep of his eyes taking in Carnahan's body and the blood spreading on her left sleeve.

"Keep going, Starling. Move it."

Gun out, she stepped over Carnahan's legs, passing another pallet and another without taking fire. They were almost to the door now. The right aisle was clear. As she swiveled to check the left, a hand clamped down on her wrist and yanked. The force dragged her forward, off her feet. She thrust out blindly with her left arm, pain screaming as her attacker swung her around and slammed her face-first into the corner of a pallet stacked high with crates. Clarice twisted her head away and took the hit on her left collarbone. Wood splintered; she hoped that was all that had.

Her gun fell from numb fingers. She used the crates to launch herself backward, aiming to catch him in the face with her skull, but he was too tall. She barely clipped his chin. She struggled to pull out of his grip, spinning to face him. His boot came down on her right foot like a sledgehammer. His left arm thrust forward, grabbing her throat and pushing her back. His fingers closed around her neck; his thumb pressed deeper into the soft skin covering her windpipe. She gagged, choking, as tears flooded down her cheeks. Inhaling was impossible. Her thoughts scattered.

It might have been the lack of oxygen, a touch of hysteria, that made her laugh when her attacker started to fall. The entry wound was precise, a neat circle above his right ear. His brains were splattering out the left side before his hand even realized it should let go of her throat. She could shove him away easily now, ignoring the pain in her left arm.

"Starling!" Brigham crowded her with his body. "I gotcha, we're good, backup's on the—"

The rapid-fire rattle of a machine gun drowned out the rest of his words. The impact against the back of his vest pressed him even closer to her. Clarice fumbled for the gun in his hand, grabbing it before it could fall.

"Brigham? Brigham? John?" He slumped at her shoulder, the left one, and she bit her tongue to keep from screaming. Her eyes swept the aisle behind him. Clear. The bullets kept coming. _Up, dammit, he's higher – there!_

She fired over Brigham's shoulder, using his body to stabilize her trembling arm, targeting the man crouched on a stack of crates. Pull, pull, pull, pull, pull, pull, pull, click, click, click-click-click-click.

The sound of gunfire had quieted. No more bullets came. Clarice sagged to the floor, Brigham cradled against her. The back of his vest was a shredded mess. The heat of his breath on her neck had stopped somewhere between the crates and the floor.

She ejected the magazine on autopilot and took the replacement clip from his belt, slamming it home and raising the gun once more. Her eyes scanned the room continuously, not even glancing down as the fingers of her left hand pressed on Brigham's neck in search of a pulse. She barely registered the lack of one.

Clarice sat still, alert, the ringing in her ears and the harsh rasp of her own breath the only noises she could hear.


	10. Chapter 10

**Jan. 18, 1992**

Hannibal Lecter did not have a clock, per se, but his internal chronometer was better than most. Lunch had been served at noon precisely, Barney being punctual as always, and it was now nearly two hours past.

Clarice Starling was late.

Technically, that was inaccurate, he reminded himself; he had no guarantees that she would come at all. She was not obligated to come, as she had done these last eight months, at 1 p.m. on the third Saturday. It was simply something she had continued doing since her graduation from the FBI Academy, once Jack Crawford had signed off on it.

Barney had already set out the metal folding chair in expectation of her arrival. Lecter searched himself for the source of the emotions beginning to writhe in his gut. Concern? Disappointment? Rage? Hmm. When had he become dependent upon her monthly appearances? She alleviated his boredom, true, and was a fun partner for his verbal sparring, but she was not _necessary_ to his existence. Desirable, but not necessary. Though he should be cross if she were to end her visits. And it would be rude of her to do so without word, and Clarice Starling was not a rude woman; therefore, she would not do so.

Ergo, something had prevented her from being on time. The variables which could affect her schedule were uncountable, but certainly the event must have been significant if it had forced her to skip a visit. Perhaps she would visit tomorrow to explain; perhaps he would have to wait until the following month. Perhaps Barney would show him her obituary in the papers later. Too many variables, not enough information, and a restless mind - that was the hell of prison.

Or perhaps, he thought, as he caught the sound of the metal grate sliding open at the far end of the hall over the annoying outbursts of his fellow inmates, perhaps he would learn now. He stood near the Plexiglas and tilted his head to better catch the sounds. Barney's footsteps, yes, but slower than usual. A companion, but not Clarice's firm, confident step. Something dragging or shuffling against the floor. A slight squeak, like sneakers on a hardwood floor. Odd.

Barney was speaking too quietly for him to catch every word.

"...want to stay?... an extra chair..."

Was that the murmur of Clarice's voice next? He really ought to tell her to speak up. No matter; Barney was replying.

"...you're sure... be watching... me a sign if..."

"Thank you, Barney." Yes, that was Clarice's soft drawl, slightly exaggerated; she sounded tired. Had she overslept? More murmurs.

Finally, Barney's voice, in a normal tone. "I'll be back with that chair in just a minute."

"Take your time, Barney; I'm not going anywhere fast, unless Dr. Lecter opts to throw me out for my lateness."

The doctor stepped back from the glass and assumed a neutral posture, waiting. It should have taken Clarice just a few seconds to come into view; instead, the shuffling and squeaking continued as Barney's footsteps, faster now, departed and returned.

Though he kept his face impassive, the doctor was intrigued when the orderly set up a second chair turned sideways in front of the first.

It took significantly more effort to conceal his surprise – and anger – when Clarice shuffled into view. His eyelids twitched; the hands clasped behind his back tightened, unseen. He affected a light tone when he spoke.

"Why, Barney, you've brought me a wounded bird today."

The doctor's eyes missed nothing in their inspection. Clarice wore navy blue sweatpants with the initials FBI emblazoned in white on the leg and a matching sweatshirt. The right pants leg was distended, stretched around a walking cast; her right hand rested on a cane, shifting her weight from the injury. Her left arm lay in a white sling, tucked in close against her body; a garish deep purple bruise peeked out from beneath the sling strap where it overlapped the collar of her sweatshirt on the right side of her neck. The bruising looked suspiciously like part of a handprint.

"She's a stubborn one, Doctor. Came down all them stairs like this after the director said the elevator was for staff and patient transfers only."

"Did she now?" Yet another mark against dear old Freddie in the mental ledger; if the fool continued his campaign of ill-treatment toward Clarice, he might just become the nemesis he pathetically believed himself to be. "How thoughtful of the director to attend to his work so assiduously on a Saturday."

Barney gave an apologetic shrug, a hint of anger in his usually placid expression. "Front desk called him at home to ask permission for a visitor to use the elevator before sending her down. If they'd've called me down here first, I'd've gone up and got her with the elevator, permission or no."

The doctor watched as Clarice carefully lowered herself into her normal chair. Barney quickly knelt and helped her raise her right leg to rest upon the second chair he had placed in the hall. The smile she granted him was strained. Clearly the effort to get this far had overtaxed her.

"Thank you, Barney."

"It's nothing, Clarice. You rest here a bit. When you're ready, you just give me a wave." He pointed to the camera high in the corner. "Don't try walking back on your own, understand?"

Her answering nod was a beat slow, Lecter noted, but she made no protest. Barney stood up, momentarily blocking the doctor's view of the young agent while also blocking her view of their expressions. The orderly widened his eyes and tilted his head slightly, a gesture the doctor took to indicate that he should take care with Clarice today. He nodded once in solemn understanding, choosing to be charmed by Barney's protectiveness rather than insulted by the implication that he needed a reminder to treat his guest with the appropriate care. The orderly's concern for Clarice could be useful in the future.

"Well, I'll leave you two to your chat, then." Barney quickly disappeared down the hallway.

"Good afternoon, Clarice," the doctor offered. "Would that I could say you're looking well."

"S'alright, Doctor. It's a lie that'd be tough to swallow just now, and I'd rather have the truth anyway."

She spoke slowly, with slightly slurred sibilants. He stared at her eyes and quickly stepped sideways; her tracking was sluggish, her pupils overly dilated. She had taken a significant dose of analgesics, then, and yet they hadn't been enough to entirely suppress the pain he could see in her face.

"Sorry I'm late today, Doctor. Couldn't drive myself, and Delia fussed for nearly an hour before she gave in. Wouldn't let me out of the house without taking the hydrocodone the ER docs prescribed, either, so I know I'm not nearly as sharp as I should be for a conversation with you – I'm trusting you'll make allowance, Doctor."

"A dangerous assumption, Clarice, but essentially correct. I shall be the very model of gentlemanly restraint." He stepped forward, casually leaning against the glass. "Your friend really shouldn't have let you out of the house at all."

Clarice smiled.

"I'll have to tell her you agreed with her. Maybe she'll change her tune just to be contrary." She started to shrug before quite obviously thinking better of the movement. "I was pretty insistent."

"Oh? And why was that, Clarice?" His voice slid into gentle mockery of her accent. "If you say you missed my handsome face, you might make me blush." He fluttered his eyelashes at her.

Her eyes widened as she gawked at him. He did so enjoy surprising her.

"I think I must've taken one too many of those pills, Dr. Lecter."

"I think you haven't taken quite enough, Clarice. You should be lying on a soft bed, drowsy and pain-free. Why then are you sitting on a hard chair in a musty dungeon, wincing each time you move?"

"I wanted… needed… to see you."

"Tell me why, Clarice."

"I don't…." Her face scrunched up; her thumb rubbed against the handle of her cane. "I just needed to."

"All right. We'll come back to that, hmm? Tell me about your injuries, Clarice. Saving the lambs, were you?"

She looked more stricken, not less, by the new question.

"No." Her voice had lost all volume; it was barely audible amid the background noises of the asylum. He watched her lips closely. "He died anyway."

"This man who died, you knew him well?"

"He taught me to shoot at the academy." Her voice was flat, detached. She had not yet cried, he judged; her grief was still locked inside her. "Thursday was my first real raid. He put me on his team."

Less than forty-eight hours ago, then. She needed better, more formidable friends to look after her well-being, he thought. Were he in charge of her care, she would be sleeping comfortably now, her every need attended to with alacrity. _No, not so – she would not have been injured in the first place._ Fanciful thoughts, of course, as he would almost certainly never be able to fulfill such intentions.

He returned to the conversation at hand; the slightly unfocused look in Clarice's eyes made it likely she hadn't even noticed the pause.

"He trusted in your abilities."

"Yeah."

"Was his trust misplaced, Clarice? Were your abilities not up to the task?"

Her face twitched.

"Ability wasn't the problem, Doctor. But, yeah, his trust was misplaced. Mine, too. The whole thing was a clusterfu- …um, a bad scene right from the start. We were on loan to DEA, taking down a drug ring. They knew we were coming; they knew the order of attack points. They waited until we were committed, and then they opened fire."

"Such substantial knowledge on their part would seem to indicate a well-placed individual with significant access to operational information."

"Yeah. A traitor. Internal investigation is trying to pin down the leak. Doesn't matter. Brigham's still dead. I still killed four people. One of 'em should've been sitting in math class, not firing at federal agents."

"Mmm. That's not what bothers you the most, though, is it, Clarice?"

"No," she whispered.

"No." He waited.

"They never shoulda known. We shoulda been able to take down the whole crew without firing a shot. But somebody I work with, somebody who swore the same oath I did… somebody's a liar. Somebody thought a payday was more important than keeping cocaine off the streets, more important than saving lives."

Hurt and confusion lined her face. She was beautiful in the midst of tragedy; he took note of the tiniest details that he might recreate her expression in a sketch later. The FBI was no longer true north on her moral compass. He found himself pleased that her awakening had come sooner, rather than later; it wouldn't do to have watched her waste away into yet another resigned bureaucrat. Not his Clarice.

"Your colleagues are not the paragons of virtue you so revered?"

"I guess not, Doctor. Some of 'em, anyway."

"How does it feel to know you cannot trust your colleagues, Clarice? That they don't 'have your back,' as the saying goes?"

She shifted in her chair, brushing her shoulder against the metal. The fingers of her left hand briefly curled around the edge of her sling.

"Uncomfortable, Doctor."

"Elaborate, please."

"If you don't know who you can trust, then you can't trust anyone. Any smiling face in the conference room could be the one selling you out for a vacation home or a yacht or whatever tickles their fancy."

Her eyes were glazed with pain, though he couldn't determine whether it was primarily emotional or physical. He had the impulse to soothe her and quickly checked it; that urge merited further consideration, but not yet where she could witness.

"That's not what I signed up for, Doctor. I thought I was acting in service of justice. Truth. Protecting the innocent." Her face twitched again, in frustration, he judged. "I know how that sounds."

"Oh?"

"Naïve. Childish."

"Mmm. And now you're in a pit of vipers with unknown motives and a proclivity for striking out in any direction when it suits them."

"I put my faith in the FBI. I was wrong."

Her head hung down slightly, either from shame or weariness, he thought. Caution was the order of the day; she'd handed him such a beautiful opportunity that it would be impolite to waste it, but the wrong words could simply send her back to her abusive husband. Harshness would not help him now. Gently, gently, he pushed.

"It was easier that way, wasn't it, Clarice? To allow the Bureau to determine right from wrong? To go where your masters pointed you?" He deliberately kept his tone light, conversational. "They named the 'bad' guys and you rescued the sheep."

She nodded, her lips pulled tightly together. If only she would raise her head, that he might see her eyes. Her voice whispered across the space between them.

"But maybe they don't care about the sheep. Maybe our goals aren't the same. How can I follow what I can't believe in?"

"Perhaps you cannot, Clarice. Perhaps you must lead."

Silence, as she digested the thought. He knew the exact moment it came to her, the connection, the answer she had known all along.

Her inhalation was sudden, forceful. Her head lifted, her eyes meeting his.

"That's why I had to come here. Why it couldn't wait." Her eyes widened with a hint of panic. "You don't serve false masters; you follow your own code, one that you've set down for yourself. But I'm… I'm not you, Doctor."

"No, Clarice, you're entirely yourself. You're young; you've yet to decide who and what you will be. You may choose to let the FBI lead you astray. You may choose to wage war upon its corrupt halls from within. You may choose to follow another path entirely.

"But you must remember that the _choice_ is yours alone."

Her eyes closed as she struggled to maintain her composure. He allowed her the time she needed, studying the way she held herself – cracked ribs, most likely taped – and the traces of exhaustion she was no longer even trying to hide from him. Because she lacked the energy or because she knew the attempt was futile? Or perhaps, a small voice whispered deep in his mind, perhaps because she feels safe here. _With me._

A change of subject was called for; he cast about for a suitable topic.

"Is your friend waiting for you in the car, Clarice?"

She shook her head slowly, a smile tugging at the side of her mouth.

"No, and don't think that wasn't an argument, too. She's enjoying a shopping spree with my credit card. I told her I'd call if I needed her before visiting hours were over."

"Ah, excellent, then we have some time yet. Tell me, Clarice, are you familiar with Austria?"

"You mean aside from seeing 'The Sound of Music,' Doctor?"

"Well, if you wish to serenade me, my dear, I could think of any number of preferable musical sources, but by all means, impress me with your 'Favorite Things.'"

He kept up the inconsequential banter until Barney arrived to escort Clarice out. He had made her smile; he had made her eyes sparkle despite the painkillers clouding them. It should have concerned him that such things had become the measure of his days, but he found he couldn't bring himself to care. Clarice Starling had been nudged from her path; whether this new direction would align her path with his own remained to be seen.

In the meantime, he would continue to cultivate her friendship and prepare to take advantage of the next opportunity for escape that presented itself. He could hardly hope to conduct a proper courtship from behind asylum walls.


	11. Chapter 11

**Feb. 14, 1992**

Relief washed over Clarice in a wave when she arrived home from work Friday, followed swiftly by annoyance.

She had spent two weeks on mandatory medical leave after the shooting, leaving the house only to attend the debriefings and counseling sessions required before she could return to work. Unable to practice with her violin because of the healing bullet wound in her left arm, she spent hours with little to occupy her time but her recent conversations with Hannibal Lecter.

_Believe me, you don't want Hannibal Lecter inside your head._

Mr. Crawford's warning was useless to her now; she doubted she could ever eject the doctor's voice from her mind, even if she lived to be 100. What's worse, she didn't seem to want to.

It shouldn't have bothered her that no packages arrived on her doorstep in those two weeks. It shouldn't have bothered her that no packages arrived in the subsequent two weeks, either. It shouldn't have bothered her that tomorrow was the third Saturday of the month and she had gotten no word of any kind from the doctor since she had visited him in January.

But she hadn't realized just how bothered she was until she saw the plain brown box sitting on the porch. The tightness in her muscles eased. Her steps seemed lighter, despite the supportive wrapping she still wore on her right foot. She felt herself grinning like a fool as she bent down to pick up the box. The slightly rough grain of the brown paper under her fingers spread contentment across her skin that lasted until she set the box down on the kitchen table.

_Shit. When did I start needing his gifts like a junkie needs a fix? What am I doing? When did it all get so... personal?_

She eyed the package with sudden suspicion. Today was Valentine's Day. Plenty of her co-workers had sported flowers on their desks - single long-stemmed roses, bouquets, the occasional live plant - and Ardelia had a night out with Luther planned. It was a day for romance. A deliberate choice on the doctor's part, to have his gift delivered today?

"Of course it was deliberate, idiot." She sat down at the table. "When does that man ever do anything that isn't planned out six ways to Sunday?"

So had he chosen the latest possible delivery window because of the date or because Behavioral Science wouldn't have time to study his words before she visited again? Probably both, she acknowledged. Operating on a single track wasn't his style.

She was more conscious, now, of the care she took in unwrapping the package. She recognized the rising excitement, the pleasure she took in receiving something he had chosen for her. Something he wanted her to have.

This box was a white one like the very first, a plain shirt box. She had worn the shirt and the necklace, studied the opera, eaten the meal and attended the cultural events to please him, hadn't she? It had pleased _her_ to please _him_.

She felt faintly nauseated. _What the hell is wrong with me?_

Gripping the box in both hands, she lifted the lid. The familiar cream-colored envelope lay on a bed of pale blue tissue paper. Something darker lay beneath. She brushed the tissue paper aside as she removed the envelope and slid out the letter within.

Something between a sob and a laugh caught in her throat. He knew. Of course he'd known.

**Dear Clarice,**

**What an inconvenience, that such a milestone as our second Valentine's Day together should be marred by your injuries and my incarceration. We simply must speak about your choice of career, my dear. I'm afraid I cannot help but worry for your safety. Perhaps Uncle Jack could find a remedy, hmm? **

**Did you expect, when it began, that our relationship would last so long? I confess, I did not. Please accept my apologies for doubting you, Clarice. I should have anticipated that the dogged determination expressed in your professional life would carry over into your private life. I am part of your private life now, Clarice, am I not? I do hope so. We could have some fun. **

**To that end, I am enclosing a gift more suited to the holiday than the one I offered last year. I don't suppose I could persuade you to wear it when you visit. No? Pity. It's for the best, though, my dear. I have no intention of sharing such a lovely sight with my keepers. **

**Sweet dreams, Clarice.**

**With fond affection,**

**Hannibal **

She set the letter down and lifted the pile of sleek silk by its spaghetti straps. Deepest blue, floor-length, with laces criss-crossing the back. A nightgown, but not the sort comfortably worn for sleeping. A second pile of silk proved to be a matching robe. Beneath both lay a pair of ballet slippers in the same shade.

"What, no matching panties, Doctor? Because _that_ would be crossing the line?"

_Or because I wouldn't need them._

Clarice Starling sat at the kitchen table until the sun came up. For once, it wasn't the lambs that kept her from her bed.

* * *

><p><strong>Feb. 15, 1992<strong>

"Why me, Doctor?"

A raised eyebrow was an eloquent enough answer, he judged. _Mustn't give away the game too soon._

"You know what I'm asking, Doctor, so don't give me that canny look. Would you have done the same with any agent Mr. Crawford sent to talk to you?"

"Done the same what, Clarice?" Oh, yes, he enjoyed riling her up.

"The letters, Doctor. The gifts. The snide remarks. The personal questions. The _insinuations_."

Well now. She hadn't taken long at all to come around to her real question. And yet evidence of his appreciation for her form as well as her mind had not bothered her previously. _She wasn't aware of her own feelings then. She is now._ He quelled a shiver of delight at the thought.

"It would depend upon a great many circumstances, Clarice; I cannot say for certain, but I suspect not." He smiled, slowly. "There is, after all, only one Clarice Starling."

"Why are you doing this to me, Doctor?" Her whispered plea was a heady mix of anger and pain.

"Am I, Clarice? Is it my actions that so distress you or your own?"

She looked away. Guilt, he expected. She was rather prone to it. Rooting out such deeply learned behavior would take time and patience; it was unlikely to be achieved when prison walls still separated them. He set the thought aside for later consideration.

But even her guilt could not defeat her courage or her honesty.

"I feel like I'm betraying my principles, Doctor, every time I look forward to our Saturdays. When I see a box waiting for me on the porch and I feel... exhilarated."

She had substituted a word at the last, he knew; her hesitation had been obvious as she groped for her second choice. He rather suspected the word that had originally come to her mind was the same as the one that came to his: _aroused_.

He had anticipated her difficulty would arise eventually, of course, but it seemed the botched raid in January had unsettled her sense of self enough for his words to push her off balance. Her aggressively negative response was to be expected. No doubt she would be harsher with herself than with him. His courtship, it seemed, was proceeding quite well despite its current limitations.

"Betrayal has been weighing on your mind of late, Clarice. It's only natural that you should question yourself in light of recent events."

She threw him an irritated glance. "Yes, thank you, Doctor, for that _astute_ summary of my mental state. I've had quite enough of people digging around in my head."

"Your Bureau psychiatrist doesn't _satisfy_, Clarice?"

She snorted.

"First of all, he's a psychologist, not a psychiatrist, and secondly, he's not putting in nearly as much effort as you are."

She seemed taken aback by her own words, as though she hadn't quite intended to say so much, and he allowed some of his amusement to show in his eyes.

"I do hope you've told him so."

"Oh, certainly, Doctor. In fact, the very first thing I said to him was 'You can't possibly compete with the psychiatrist already in my head. I'm sure you won't mind signing this paper immediately.' And he did, so my life is just peachy."

How interesting that even jokingly she should view this other man – this interloper in his territory – as competition for the real estate he already occupied. Despite her current upset, his place was secure; she defended it even against herself.

"If life is indeed 'peachy,' Clarice, why do you appear so tired today? Were your dreams less than sweet?"

"You have to fall asleep to dream, Doctor, and I had a lot on my mind."

"Tossed and turned all night, did you, Clarice?" Perhaps his gift had come at an even more opportune moment than he had anticipated, if it had affected her so strongly.

"Didn't go to bed at all, actually."

His brows drew together as he frowned at her, and he teasingly waggled a disapproving finger.

"You mustn't neglect your health, Clarice. You're still recovering from your injuries. Proper sleep will help you mend."

"Maybe I'd get more sleep if someone wasn't sending me inappropriate gifts."

"Inappropriate? Did you dislike the color? Was the fit imprecise?" He traced her form with his eyes, uncharacteristically blatant and deliberate in his appreciation.

It was necessary to push her as far as he dared while the opportunity existed, before too much thinking or talking with her roommate or Jack Crawford had sealed away his access. Her shell was lined with cracks just now; he might, were he to tap at the perfect angle, secure his place as more than an odd confidante whom she looked upon with toleration and curiosity. It would be enough to plant the idea, he expected; her mind, tenacious as it was, would tumble the thought round and round without any further prompting from him.

"I admit, I am forced to guess at such things, Clarice, having no… direct… frame of reference."

"And you won't be getting one, Doctor, so you'll have to content yourself with guessing."

"You won't tell me if my guess was accurate, Clarice? For shame."

Her teeth tugged at her lip as she looked away.

"Ah. You haven't tried it on yet. I'm hurt, Clarice. Is that why you didn't go to bed, hmm? So you might have an excuse at the ready?"

"It's hardly a gown for sleeping in, Doctor."

"Oh? Do tell, Clarice, for what purpose do you think the gown is intended?"

"I think you know, Doctor."

"I'm surprised at you, Clarice. I've never known you to be afraid to speak your mind."

The challenge was enough to goad her, as he knew it would be, though the glance she threw him made it clear she recognized and resented the manipulation.

"Seduction, Doctor."

"Fascinating. And in this scenario of yours, Clarice, are you the seductress or the seduced?"

"My scenario, Doctor? You're the one who sent the nightgown."

"You're forgetting, Clarice, that I slept quite well last night while you apparently spent several hours pondering the meaning of said gift. Would you care to share what you thought about, hmm? No?"

She was angry, he knew. Angry and guilty and uncertain. Pressing her was a calculated risk. She had not yet used the free pass he had granted her months ago; if she were truly that frightened of her feelings, she might use it now to beg a reprieve, to give herself time to re-armor and repress what so repulsed her.

"You're a killer, Doctor."

Or she might come to it directly. How lovely, to be greeted with such frankness. Very well; he would return the favor.

"As are you, Clarice."

She flinched, but her face showed no surprise. His words were merely a confirmation of her own belief reflected back at her, he knew. Would she draw the facile distinction between his own deeds and her state-sanctioned actions?

"You're right," she murmured. "I am."

No, he thought, pleased with her strength. She would take the harder road of self-examination rather than passing the responsibility along to another. He let the silence settle over them; she didn't disappoint.

"This is where you tell me I'm not like you, Doctor." Her mouth twisted in a mocking grin.

"Of course, Clarice." He adopted his most impassive face, his most deadpan tone. "You're nothing like me."

"Liar." Her voice was full of affection, though, and her smile was a true one.

"I trust you won't have any more sleepless nights, Clarice?"

"No guarantees, Doctor. But I won't be afraid of a nightgown anymore."

_Nor the scenarios it conjures, sweet Clarice?_

"An excellent beginning, my dear. Now, tell me more about this man you're seeing."

She laughed, then, but readily divulged the details of her sessions with the Bureau psychologist. He had little doubt that, of the two of them, she had been the more insightful one in that room.


	12. Chapter 12

**Feb. 28, 1992**

"You wanted to see me, sir?" Clarice poked her head around the corner of Jack Crawford's basement office.

"Starling." Crawford looked up from his desk. "Take a seat."

She claimed the chair in front of the desk and waited while he studied her. His scrutiny was more obvious than the doctor's, but perhaps he wanted to see if she would squirm. She stared calmly back.

"How've you been, Starling?"

"Fine, sir."

His head tipped slightly to the right. "It's alright if you aren't, Starling. What happened last month rattled seasoned agents. You held it together when it mattered."

She shrugged, the motion pulling a bit at the still-healing tissue in her left arm.

"Really, sir, I'm fine."

She could see the wheels turning behind his eyes as he worked to find another opening.

"You and John Brigham were close; no one would fault you for being distracted or… upset."

"I'm not sure what you mean by 'close,' sir. He was helping me train for the interservice pistol competition. We got along well."

"Of course, Starling. I wasn't implying otherwise."

It was a given that he was, in fact, implying otherwise; she supposed it was better than having him think she was mooning over Hannibal Lecter. _I'd never be able to explain that one away._

"Look, I'm going to level with you, Starling. You've seemed a little… off… in the last few weeks."

_Oh, really, have I? I'm sure it's nothing important, sir; I'm just realizing that I trust Hannibal Lecter more than half of my co-workers and it's possible that I might, maybe, someday, want… something… more than afternoon chats with a man who's going to be locked up for serial murder for the rest of his life. But no, that's not a reason to be a little "off." Not at all._

"I'm dealing with it, sir. I've been attending the mandatory counseling sessions."

"I know, Starling; I've seen the reports." He held up a placating hand, and Clarice furiously choked down the feeling of betrayal rising in her throat. "Relax. Nothing you've said is in there; they're just Dr. Taylor's assessments of your mental readiness for fieldwork."

Her body was tense in the chair, her left hand fisted against her thigh. She smoothed out her expression and slowly straightened her fingers. Crawford nodded toward her hand.

"It's nice to see there's something under that calm façade, Starling. You can control it, and that's good, that's key in the field, but you've got to let it out sometime. Find a hobby. And no, pistol shooting doesn't count. You need to take downtime when you have the chance. I know it doesn't seem like it matters when you're pushing papers and running down numbers, but it'll matter when you get to BSU. We all need a break sometimes."

He paused, tapping his index finger on the desk. He was coming to a point, she thought, and he wanted to be certain he had her full attention. She leaned forward slightly, encouraging him to continue.

"We have a case out west. Seven months, six murders, five cities, same MO. The team is burned out. I want fresh eyes on it, Starling. Your eyes." He grimaced like he'd tasted something sour. "And Lecter's, if you can get him to cooperate. We're struggling with the profile."

He pointed to a file box on the floor beside the desk.

"Two copies, one soft-paper-only for him, one for you. If he won't go for it, then we're done. You don't owe him anything, Starling; either he helps with the case or the visits stop."

Clarice was very careful to keep her eyes on the box as she nodded. Mr. Crawford had no need to know that the idea of ending her visits fueled a panicked flight of butterflies in her gut. In all the months she'd been visiting, even with the latest gift of lingerie, she had never once considered threatening to stop coming. It would be an empty threat, and the doctor would know it before the words even left her lips.

"I understand, sir. I'm certain he'll cooperate. He won't want to end his little games in a fit of pique."

"You know you can put your foot down whenever you like, Starling. He might be a useful resource, but you shouldn't have to put up with… well. That last gift he sent was—"

"—was just another attempt to rattle us by trying a new angle. It's to be expected, sir. I've already handled it."

She was still, calm, as he took her measure. Only her earnest desire to succeed – her burning ambition to gain a spot in Behavioral Science – showed in her eyes. Everything else was locked down tight, resistant to all intruders save one. And wouldn't he be surprised when she showed up three weeks early?

Crawford finally nodded. "Alright, Starling. Get outta here and get to work."

"Thank you, sir." She grabbed the box and departed, suddenly eager for tomorrow to arrive.

* * *

><p><strong>Feb. 29, 1992<strong>

Hannibal Lecter lay on his bunk, hands clasped on his stomach, contemplating the mysteries of Clarice Starling. Such thoughts were, of late, his favorite pastime. Each of their meetings revealed more of her inner workings, her magnificently ordered mind with its charming flaws.

He was reviewing their most recent chat, pausing to study her expressions, to wring every last drop of understanding from her reactions, when he heard the familiar sound of her footsteps. It was a ridiculous notion, of course; a mere two weeks had passed since their last meeting and another three lay ahead before she would return, if she held to her pattern. He considered, for a moment, that he might be experiencing an auditory hallucination brought on by his desire for her presence.

The woman herself laid that notion to rest, however, with her arrival.

"C'mon, lazybones, out of bed." He shifted his head to catch her expression; her eyes were bright, her grin eager and growing – enhanced, no doubt, by her joy in catching him less than prepared for her. She hefted a box in her arms. "We've got a case."

Ah. A case, of course. That would explain the early visitation and the joy written across her features. He would excuse the casual greeting, though he did not believe that the moniker "lazybones" truly applied. He swung his legs down from the bed and stood.

"Good afternoon to you as well, Clarice. Am I to understand this is an actual case and not some grade-school challenge Uncle Jack has devised?"

"It's a bona fide case, Doctor. Six women murdered in the last seven months. I have a copy of the case file for you."

"Will we be working this one together, Clarice?"

"If you'll have me, Doctor. I've read through my copy, but I thought we could go over it together this afternoon if you don't have plans."

Interestingly, he didn't detect any mockery in her tone. True plans were an impossibility, of course, but her courtesy was such that she would allow him the option to excuse himself for whatever reason. Perhaps she considered his mental explorations plans of a sort. But as he had no plans for the afternoon other than reviewing his interactions with her, and he now had the genuine article in front of him, he was content to look over this new case and soak up her excitement.

"By all means, Clarice, send it through."

He picked up the file from the food carrier and laid it on his small table. Her eagerness seemed colored by relief, and he couldn't resist indulging.

"So I'm to give you something for nothing, Clarice?"

"Hardly nothing, Doctor." Did she realize how often her facial expressions now mimicked his own? Her raised eyebrow and sardonic smile seemed a perfect match for his. "How many free questions have I answered for you in the last nine months?"

He nodded to acknowledge the point before beginning to flip through the pages in front of him. Soft paper only, of course.

"Tell me, Clarice, what if I had declined to participate in this little investigation?"

She paused a moment before beginning to lay pages and photos out on the floor in front of her. "Mr. Crawford would have used it as a pretext to end our chats, Doctor."

"And you would simply stop visiting on Uncle Jack's say-so, Clarice? That seems unlike you."

"I wouldn't really have a choice in the matter, Doctor."

He pressed a finger to his lip, feigning deep thought. "You could visit as a private citizen."

She responded with a withering stare, clearly not buying his act. How delightful.

"That would make things a little awkward at work, Doctor."

"Ah, yes, I see how that might make Jack feel a bit threatened."

Her eyes flickered as she digested his meaning, but she ignored the comment. An idea she had considered herself? Hmm. Perhaps his comments regarding Jackie-boy's interest in her had taken root more deeply than he previously suspected.

"Director Chilton wouldn't allow it anyway, Doctor. If I didn't have the weight of Behavioral Science behind me, he wouldn't let me in the door." She paused, affecting an impression of surprised thought herself. Mirroring him. He was quite pleased with such progress. "Why, I do think he doesn't like me!"

He smiled, leaning forward, as though confiding a secret. "It's quite all right, Clarice. I don't think he likes me, either."

She rewarded him with a laugh. He pressed on with the game.

"Well, then, we could take ol' Freddie to court for denying me my visitors. Those are the sorts of things one pays lawyers to handle, Clarice."

"A lawsuit, Doctor? Because that would be so much _less_ awkward at work, when my co-workers ask me why my face is on the front of the Tattler next to the headline 'Cannibal's Jailhouse Bride Desperate to Get In' or some other BS."

Interesting. Her responses required no true pauses to think, which meant she had already considered each of the avenues he suggested. Perhaps she had given Jack an earful on the subject.

Aloud, he said only, "I had no idea you wished to be married, Clarice. Would a summer wedding suit?"

"I'm really more of an autumn girl, Doctor." She hadn't even looked up from the pages she was spreading on the floor in front of his cell. "If we get to work now, I promise I'll let you interrogate me about dresses and flowers and musical selections later."

"Of course, Clarice. Menace and murder first, wedding plans later." He turned his face to the pages in front of him and began to read, ignoring the eyes he could feel watching him before she, too, became absorbed in the work.

* * *

><p><strong>March 4, 1992<strong>

"One day of studying the files with Lecter and you're convinced the fourth murder was a copycat?" Jack Crawford shook his head as he flipped through the report she'd submitted Monday morning. "You know we've had seasoned agents on this case for months, Starling. What makes you so sure?"

Clarice refrained from mentioning that it had been more like three hours, not a full day, and that she and the doctor had been in agreement about the fourth murder after the first thirty minutes.

"It's laid out in the report, sir. You said you wanted fresh eyes; that's what I've given you."

"The knot-tying technique."

"It's subtle, yes, but it's different. The person who killed the fourth woman doesn't have the same skill with ropes. The timing doesn't fit the pattern. It's a second kill in the same city, which the perpetrator has not done otherwise."

She stopped, aware that she was rushing forward in her eagerness to prove her theory. _Take a breath, Clarice. You know your explanation is the right one. Dr. Lecter agrees with you, even if Mr. Crawford doesn't._

Her conscience tripped at the thought. She wanted the Behavioral Science slot; surely it was disloyal to trust Hannibal Lecter's opinion over Jack Crawford's. She shifted uncomfortably in the chair.

Crawford sighed.

"I'll pass it on to the team, Starling, but only as a possible theory. You're still working on a profile?"

"Yes, sir, the doctor and I are meeting again Saturday to put together our thoughts on the killer."

He half-smiled. "You're a go-getter, Starling, I'll give you that. Once you sink your teeth into a project, you don't let it go."

Clarice responded with an empty half-smile of her own. Had the doctor made the same comment, it might have been with approval and a wicked playfulness about teeth. From Jack Crawford, it sounded like disbelief with a tinge of disapproval. "No, sir."


	13. Chapter 13

**March 7, 1992**

"You're spoiling me, Clarice."

She looked up from her case file, the institutional lighting glinting off her hair, her eyes bright.

"Am I?"

"Two visits in as many weeks? Tongues must be wagging."

She shrugged and looked down, though not before he noted the flash of distress on her face.

"If the profile's right, Doctor, the gossip won't matter."

Ah. So there was, indeed, gossip.

"Your colleagues weren't pleased with your conclusions about the case thus far, Clarice?"

"_Our_ conclusions, Doctor, and I think it was less that they disliked the conclusions and more that they disliked the source."

Interesting, that she was so determined to give him credit for the insights. In truth, he had done little but assist her in clarifying her own thoughts. He pushed on into more emotional territory.

"Tell me, Clarice, do they resent that Uncle Jack asked for your input after their months of toil have resulted in little success?"

She stopped fiddling with the pages. After a moment, she met his gaze.

"I put your name on the report. Not by itself, but with mine, I mean."

He was quite careful to hide his surprise. His face maintained a blank, neutral expression; he spoke in a considered, even tone. "Why would you do that, Clarice?"

"You did the work with me, Doctor; you should get the credit." Her face took on a mulishly determined cast. "That's the way things should work. It's only fair."

"But 'things,' as you say, don't work that way, do they, Clarice?"

She laughed, unhappily. "Not as such, Doctor, no. Mr. Crawford presented the information to the team, but I believe the general response was that you were fucking with them and I was brainwashed."

"Mmm. I suppose I do have a reputation for… _fucking_… with the authorities."

Clarice cringed at his vulgarity, though he hadn't noticed her own bothering her at all. He raised an eyebrow.

"Sorry, Doctor. It just sounds worse when you say it." She shook her head. "Nevermind. Let's just put together this profile, and they can go… uh… hang."

"As you say, Clarice. Shall we begin with the position of the bodies, and what it tells us about the killer's motivation?"

The exchange continued for hours as they bounced ideas back and forth. When Clarice had finally departed for the evening, the doctor returned his thoughts to her admission. Was her joining of their names merely a principled stand for justice and credit where credit was due, or had she subconsciously yearned for something to call theirs, a product of two minds working in harmony? He rather hoped for the latter. His yearning, after all, was not subconscious in the least.

* * *

><p><strong>March 16, 1992<strong>

Clarice ran her fingers across the smooth marble surface of the sculpture. Slightly smaller than the length of her forearm, the carving featured a girl lying on her side, her head pillowed on her hands, a snake cradled to her budding bosom. The snake's body wound up and over the girl's neck; its tongue was captured delicately in mid-flick against her ear.

The doctor's latest letter lay on the table. Her eyes drifted back to it, though his words still echoed in her ears.

**Dear Clarice,**

**Are you familiar with the tale of Cassandra of Troy, Clarice? An honorable woman, laid low by the corrupt souls around her who refused to hear her truths. Their willful ignorance brought her to dishonor and death.**

**Shall I call you Cassandra, then, my dear? It seems appropriate, for all the credence Uncle Jack and his little band of would-be warriors give to your words. Your insight is too sharp for their dull wits, my dear; they will cut themselves on it, and it will be the lambs who bleed. **

**Perhaps you have come across the tale in psychology if not in the classics. Though some would say it was Apollo who granted her the gift of prophecy, I myself prefer the image of the temple snakes whispering in her ears as she slept, licking them clean of the world's corruption so that she might be opened to a higher truth.**

**Do you hear that truth calling to you, Clarice? When you awake in the night, breathless and terrified, cursing the futility of your actions, do you wish for one who could clear away falsehood and truly hear you?**

**Verum affert nobis pacem,**

**Hannibal**

She knew what he was doing; with a degree in psychology, how could she not? Telling her that the truth would bring them peace, as if it were the two of them against the world. Creating a shared cocoon of understanding, giving her a refuge from the indignities of being a first-year agent in a boys club.

The trouble was that knowing what he was doing didn't make the ploy any less tempting. And knowing he was doing it meant he was also doing something else, something less obvious.

She laid her head down on her arm, letting one finger trace the line of the serpent as her mind wandered – at least until a hand waved in front of her face.

"Hey, Earth to roomie." Ardelia pulled out the chair opposite Clarice's and sat down, dropping a takeout bag on the table. "I brought dinner."

Clarice blinked and sat up. "Thanks, Dee." She moved to gather up the letter, the gift, and the wrappings they came in.

"Whoa, is that from _him_? What'd he say?" Ardelia reached for the letter lying on the table; Clarice's hand got there first, hastily pulling it back.

"Just the usual, nothing important." But she couldn't meet her roommate's eyes as she lied.

"Clarice…." Ardelia's voice was uncharacteristically tentative. "Have you… talked to Crawford?"

"The package just arrived today, Dee. I'll take it in to BSU in the morning."

"No, I mean, about all of this. I mean… look, I know I'm not the psych major here, but you know what you look like, don't you?"

Clarice stared at the letter trapped under her hand. "Enlighten me, bestest bud."

"See! That, right there. What's with the defensive tone? Why can't I see the letter?" Ardelia took a breath and put a fingertip on the paper. "If it makes you feel ashamed, Cee, it's wrong."

"I'm not _ashamed_, Dee. It's just…" _private_.

Well, she could hardly say that. She'd be handing the letter over to Behavioral Science tomorrow anyway, so they could run tests and make copies and theorize ridiculous notions based on the weight of the stroke of a felt-tipped pen. She shouldn't feel nearly so possessive, and yet… she couldn't say Ardelia was wrong, exactly.

Except it wasn't the doctor's words that she was ashamed of; it was her own inclination to be drawn in by them. And it wasn't so much shame as it was... pride. Pride that he had chosen to share his thoughts with her.

"Just what? Are you going to make excuses for his behavior? For a cannibalistic serial killer? Jesus, Cee, you sound like a battered spouse or one of those jailhouse groupies."

"I didn't know you got your news from the Tattler, Dee. You should think about dating Paul Krendler sometime – I hear his wife doesn't mind, and apparently you both think I trade blow jobs for information."

"Fuck, I'm trying to _help_ you, Clarice! I'm worried about you. You're different, lately, and you're so damn secretive about this Lecter thing. I thought you were gonna be open and honest."

"You wanna read it?" Clarice shoved the letter across the table. "Fine, read the damn thing."

They stared at each other across the table, eyes locked until Ardelia picked up the letter and began to read. Clarice struggled to push down the anger that had surged up so suddenly. She wasn't mad at Dee, not really. She was just mad.

Was it crazy to think that the only one who would understand her anger was a man who seemed without anger himself? He was so emotionless. She frowned. No, that wasn't right. He had shown a sliver of emotion at Christmas, and she occasionally caught signs of… something… in his eyes. _Not emotionless… just well controlled. I need that. _

Ardelia set the letter down and pushed it back across the table. Clarice looked up to see a mix of compassion and pity on her face. The anger rippled in her gut. _I don't need pity, Dee._

But Ardelia had clearly already decided that she did.

"It hurts, right? Because you think he understands you and they don't." Delia slid forward in her chair, reaching an arm across the table to cover Clarice's hand. "He's a killer and a manipulator, Cee. You _know_ that. Everything he says is suspect."

Clarice managed a weak smile.

"Right. I know that. The manipulation is obvious." _Too obvious for the doctor. If he were trying to manipulate me, he'd be more subtle about it. He tells me the truth and knows they'll see it only as manipulation._

She pulled her hand out from under Ardelia's, careful not to move too quickly lest her roommate see it for the rejection it was.

"Let me just toss this junk in my room, and then we can eat." Clarice laid the statue back in its box, set the letter on top, and picked up the lot of it. "Smells like you stopped at Wei Fong's, am I right?"

Ardelia laughed.

"Yeah, smartass, like you didn't see the logo on the bag."

"Who, me? The nose never lies."

She left Ardelia pulling out plates – and forks, for when the chopsticks inevitably proved too tricky for one or both of them – and carried the so-called junk to her room with all the attentive caution of the ring bearer at a wedding. She'd get back to obsessing over it later, after she mended fences once again. If anything, Ardelia's reaction had only proved the doctor's point: Here was one more person in her life who didn't, who _couldn't_, understand her. Was it any wonder she looked forward to Saturday?

* * *

><p><strong>March 21, 1992<strong>

"Do you ever get mad, Doctor?"

He found it interesting that she hadn't built up to the question; she had gone straight from greetings to a query that he deduced – based upon the way she perched on the edge of the chair – was quite serious to her. It was to be a fun afternoon, then.

"The people who put me here tell me I'm quite mad, Clarice."

"Angry," she clarified. "And you knew what I was asking."

"Yes, I did. Does it make you _angry_ that I chose to deliberately misunderstand you, Clarice?" He withheld his smile, though she likely sensed it anyway; she could be quite perceptive at times.

"Funny, Doctor. Answer the question, please. Do you ever get _angry_?"

"I don't see a psychological evaluation in your hands, Clarice." He paced to the Plexiglas and craned his neck as though he thought she might be hiding a test booklet behind her back. "Have you left your blunt little tools in Uncle Jack's hands?"

"I'm not asking for him, Doctor; I'm asking for me." Her voice showed slight strain. Frustrated, but trying to hide it and persevering despite it, he thought.

"And why would that be, hmm? Have you experienced an unexpected surge of anger recently, Clarice?"

"I'm asking about _you_, Doctor."

Oh, yes, that was certainly frustration. He smiled pleasantly in return.

"And I'm asking about you, my dear. I believe it's called conversation."

"If it is, you're really not following the rules, Doctor."

"Mmm. And do you always follow the rules, Clarice?"

The line of her shoulders lost some of its crisp intensity.

"You're not going to tell me. You're just going to keep playing this game until you get bored with it."

"Not at all, Clarice." He studied her slumped posture, the dull affect of her words. "You've had a fight with someone important to you."

She shrugged.

"Use your words, Clarice, or sulk elsewhere."

Her head came up, as he knew it would.

"I got angry at Delia. Not for any good reason."

"For what reason, then?"

She hesitated, lips slightly parted. Her eyes fled from his gaze.

"Ah. Something about me, Clarice? I'm flattered. Tell me, what does Ms. Mapp make of our visits?"

Her wry smile conceded the point.

"Let's just say I'm pretty sure she's going to start leaving pamphlets about being a battered spouse and how to get out of an abusive relationship lying around the house."

"So you've told her about the wedding and she disapproves, hmm? We never did pick out the music or the flowers, Clarice. How shockingly negligent. Perhaps we should elope instead."

Clarice eyed the glass between them. "I think the running away part might be a problem, Doctor."

_But not the going with me, Clarice? No, you wouldn't consider it seriously, would you, but it's a unthreatening fantasy when you believe it can never happen._

"Yes, that does pose a difficulty. Very well, the elopement is off. Will that solve your problem with Ms. Mapp, Clarice?"

She laughed, as he'd hoped she would.

"Not exactly. I was..." - she looked away but pressed on this time, conquering her avoidance, he noted - "a little too possessive about your last letter, and she took it the wrong way, and I might have said some hurtful things. I wasn't really mad - angry - at her. She just..."

"Didn't understand you."

"Yeah. She thought... she thought I was ashamed."

"Do you think you should be ashamed, Clarice?"

"No. That's what... I didn't realize it until she tried to tell me I was."

_Excellent._ Perhaps if his suit was warmly received and the future came to pass in such a way that he and Clarice might be together, without walls, he ought to send Ms. Mapp a note of thanks. _Hmm. Yes, she'd hate that, I wager._

"And what did you feel, Clarice, if not shame?"

A long silence, in which he perceived her agitation and fear. She would be making a leap, then, perhaps over a gap she felt was uncrossable. He gave her his patient attention. She was courage itself; she would come to it eventually.

"Pride."

Her voice was firm, and he inwardly delighted in her admission.

"This feeling frightened you, did it not? And in your fear, your rage lashed out at your friend?"

She startled, eyes widening as she looked at him, but then she smiled.

"I really should just expect that from you, shouldn't I? I know it's not some crazy connection that only we share, Doctor; it's a skill you can use on anyone you like. I'm not special - there's no us-against-the-world going on here - but it's still nice to feel like someone understands me."

She shook her head, seemingly as if to deny that she liked the feeling at all.

"One does not preclude the other, Clarice; might we not share something beyond the facile manipulations that so frighten the masses?"

He was not surprised when she rushed to continue in another vein.

"So, anger management techniques, Doctor? Either you don't feel it at all, or you've got some damn good coping skills, and I need some. Which is it?"

"You wish to be more like me, Clarice?"

Her hesitation was so slight as to be almost unnoticeable.

"In this instance, Doctor, yes."

_Marvelous. _

His prediction was indeed proven correct; the afternoon proved quite amusing as he coached his lovely fledgling on techniques to present a more complete mask to the outside world. Said world seemed to be growing ever larger while their own had dwindled to two. A most satisfying development.


	14. Chapter 14

**March 31, 1992**

"I didn't want you to hear it from gossip in the halls, Starling." Jack Crawford leaned against his desk, not quite sitting on the edge.

"It's definitely our guy?" Clarice hadn't been invited to sit, and she was hardly about to do so when he was on his feet. She rested her hand on the chair back instead.

"Looks that way. Local PD turned over the case once they realized what they had. It matches the preliminary markers. I'll be heading out to Denver later this morning to study the scene and the body. Still no suspects in custody, though."

"I'm ready for fieldwork, sir, if you need a fresh set of eyes." Inwardly, she cringed, recognizing the eager-to-please tone in her voice. But dammit, she was never going to get into Behavioral Science if she didn't get more opportunities to prove herself, and those opportunities were never going to come if she didn't push for them.

"Not this time, Starling." He folded his arms across his chest, a defensive posture that instantly made her wary. His next words didn't help. "Look, Starling – Clarice – there's another reason I wanted to talk with you today."

Her given name didn't sound right in his mouth. His deliberate use of it now set her on edge. Before spending so much time with Dr. Lecter, she hadn't realized just how obvious others' manipulative efforts could be at times. She waited, but Mr. Crawford didn't continue.

"Yes, sir?"

"Agent Mapp came to see me last week."

Her blood boiled, but her face remained impassive. She focused on the rhythm of her breathing, silently thanking the doctor for his timely advice.

"In regards to what, sir?"

"I think we both know what, Starling. I was hoping you'd come talk with me yourself, but maybe Mapp was right – maybe you can't see the problem."

_I think we're defining the problem differently, sir._

She blinked once, slowly, and tilted her head to the left.

"You think Lecter's getting to me. That I can't handle him."

"The man's sent experts away in tears after five minutes of conversation, Starling. You've been visiting him every month for nearly a year now. Either you can handle him fine, or…."

He clearly lacked the courage to finish his sentence; she, having no such qualms, finished it for him.

"Or he's handling me."

Crawford had the grace to look apologetic.

Clarice sighed, using the time it gained her to review her knowledge of his temperament. She needed to avoid antagonizing him, both because she still wanted a spot in the department and – perhaps more worrisome – because he could make one phone call to Director Chilton and get her banned from the asylum. He felt guilty about sending her to Dr. Lecter in the first place; that much was evident from his overprotective behavior toward her in the past year.

She looked down at the floor, not needing to work hard to bring up a mask of pained anger before she met his eyes.

"Sir… if I were a male agent, would we even be having this conversation? Do you think that because Lecter throws some pretty words and shiny baubles my way that I somehow imagine he and I share a deep, abiding connection?"

The next part was harder, but she pushed on regardless. _Lie like you mean it, Clarice._

"He's a tool, sir. A useful tool for the job we do here. That's all." She waved the hand not gripping the chair, gesturing at the files and photos strewn around the office. "If he can help us close even one case, save one life, it's worth my time to put up with his psychological bullying. I haven't been taken in by his games, sir. It's exhausting sometimes, yes, but I'm not having a mental breakdown."

There, that ought to cover anything Ardelia had told him. Had she said those same words last year, they would have even been true. But she _had_ been different – since the moment she and the doctor had shared at Christmas, since the shootout, since he had increasingly let her see his appreciation for her as a woman with a body as well as a mind – and she _was_ different now. She couldn't exactly tell Mr. Crawford that she preferred the woman she was now to the one she had been before her life had intersected with Hannibal Lecter's. That wouldn't just be career suicide; it would be signing up for a fully fledged psychological intervention.

Crawford studied her for another minute. She met his eyes without flinching, without looking away or touching her face or making any kind of nervous movement whatsoever. She needed to sell this if she wanted to continue her visits – and while she hoped Crawford believed the determination in her eyes to be her desire for a BSU position, it was, in reality, her desire to share intelligent conversation with the one man who understood her.

"Alright, Starling." Crawford looked like a man facing a meal he'd rather not eat, and she had just shoved a fork in his hands. "You're right, the insights are useful, and if you say you're doing fine, maybe you are. I just don't want to see you burn out before I even get you in the section."

There was something else, something he wasn't saying; she could see it in the way his lips parted and his eyes looked subtly away, focusing on her ear or her shoulder, perhaps. The doctor had implied once – well, no, baldly stated – that Jack Crawford was afraid of her. She hadn't quite understood what he meant, not really, but she thought she saw a flicker of it now.

_He wants to protect me from the doctor… and the more I show him that I can handle it without him, the more he sees how comfortable I am talking to a serial killer. I'm not afraid enough to suit him, and that makes him nervous. Shit. Am I handling this all wrong?_

A sour taste rose in her throat at the idea of playing the damsel in distress for anyone. She needed an out.

"Sir, I don't think that the occasional outburst is evidence of burnout. And I took your advice about getting a hobby."

He raised an eyebrow. "Not target shooting?"

She didn't really want to share the details with him. It was private, something for herself – and for the doctor, she admitted. But it had helped her mend fences with Ardelia once, and it seemed likely to work here as well.

"Violin, sir. Very soothing. Music can provide an excellent outlet for emotions, you know."

His surprise was plain, as was his relief.

"Ah. Well, that's… that's good, Starling. Are you—"

A rap on the door led to an agent poking his head in.

"Jack? We're ready to head out." His glance took in Clarice and dismissed her in an instant. "She coming with?"

Crawford picked up a bag from the floor beside his desk. "Not this time. Starling, stay out of trouble. Davies, let's go."

Agent Davies opened the door wider, smirking as Clarice had to squeeze past him to exit. She didn't think she'd imagined the whisper of "cannibal's pet" in her ear.

She spent the rest of the morning staring at paperwork and imagining Davies writhing in pain on the floor at her feet. By the time lunch rolled around, she was smiling again. _The doctor's right; visualization is a very helpful tool for managing anger._

* * *

><p><strong>March 31, 1992<strong>

Ardelia's head was in the refrigerator when Clarice walked into the kitchen.

"Don't tell me you're actually planning to cook something."

"Hunh?" Dee backed out and stood up, triumphantly holding a bag. "Are you crazy? I have leftover Italian."

"Food of the gods." Clarice reached in before the door could close and snagged a Coke. "I'll settle for caffeine."

She leaned against the counter and drank while Ardelia warmed up dinner in the microwave.

"So, Jack Crawford says 'hi.'"

Clarice felt a rush of satisfaction when Ardelia froze in mid-movement. This wasn't about exorcising her anger, though; it was about allaying her roommate's suspicions. She had let go of the anger earlier on the shooting range.

She continued in a friendlier voice. "You must have been really worried, Dee."

Ardelia nodded as she turned around.

"I know you really want that job, Clarice. I just… don't want you to lose yourself getting it, you know?"

"I get it, Dee." And she did. The impulse itself wasn't hard to understand. The only trouble was that all of these people trying to protect her from herself didn't understand who she was.

They were trying to stop her from being the best Clarice Starling she could be. And she was beginning to suspect that part of the doctor's long game was helping her become that very thing. _He has his own reasons for doing it - of course he does - but that doesn't mean that he isn't looking out for me better than they are._

She smiled at Ardelia, projecting confidence and warmth.

"Thanks for looking out for me." Clarice nudged her with an elbow. "Just give me a heads-up next time. I nearly had a heart attack when Mr. Crawford cornered me."

Dee grimaced, and apologized, and when the microwave beeped, they dug into a pile of fettucini together. Clarice smiled, and laughed, and felt the walls going back up around her true self. The crack in their friendship was becoming a crevasse, and she was wielding the lever to widen the gap.

* * *

><p><strong>April 10, 1992<strong>

The package arrived while Ardelia was out. Clarice skipped her usual ritual in favor of disappearing into her room with the box, unwilling to be disturbed again.

She sat cross-legged in the center of her bed, fingers running lightly over the brown paper wrapping. She knew he wouldn't have touched it, that the packaging had been done by other hands, but she still pictured his elegant fingers when she slid her own under the sealed edge and slipped off the outer wrapping.

The box inside had a lift-off lid similar to the clothing boxes she'd received before, but the package had a solidity to it, a heft greater than fabric would have achieved. She curled her fingers along the sides, thumbs resting on top, and removed the lid.

The expected cream-colored envelope lay above layers of tissue paper, the doctor's familiar handwriting alive in the swirling script of her name. She stretched out a finger and traced the lines. Her lips curved up in a slight smile.

She picked up the envelope. Her heart beat faster; her body danced a complicated line between relaxed pleasure in receipt of his gift and tense anticipation for its contents.

The lone sheet of paper slid out easily and unfolded at her coaxing touch.

**My dear Clarice,**

**Can you keep a secret? **

**A ridiculous question, I know; of course you cannot, not in good conscience, not with Uncle Jack peering so intently over your shoulder at my missives. Perhaps it would be safer to keep your secrets elsewhere, hmm? **

**Is your soul filled with hidden catches, Clarice? Do your secrets yield to the right touch? What lies beneath the smooth surface of your countenance? Finding out would be an elegant art, would it not? In the right hands? **

**Alas, I fear you'll have to puzzle this one out yourself.**

**With deepest warmth,**

**Hannibal**

Her thumb stroked the paper as she read, letting his voice fill her thoughts. Their fingers had touched once, in Memphis; if she concentrated, she could feel the shock of it on her skin still.

But there was the gift yet, lying hidden beneath its tissue paper shield. She set the letter aside and reached for the box. The paper crinkled and rustled as her hands parted the flaps. And underneath… another box?

Clarice lifted the box free of its packaging.

Rich red and dark chocolate wood intertwined endlessly on all six sides. Neither top nor bottom presented itself in her initial inspection; the entire surface was smooth and sleek under her questing fingers. The edges were soft, rounded; the wood had been finished to a glossy sheen.

She tumbled it round and round in her hands, considering. _A puzzle box, Doctor?_

Several minutes passed before she was able to set the box down without instantly wanting to touch it again. The gift demanded her full attention.

She tucked her hands against her sides. _I control this; it doesn't control me._

It was that thought that kept her moving for the next two hours, accompanying her on a six-mile run around the neighborhood, following the path of her hands in the shower afterward, adding its flavor to every bite of her dinner.

She had hoped to be calmer, more controlled, when she returned to the puzzle. Instead, she was simply… more. More aware, more sensitive. Her flannel pajama pants and cotton shirt chafed as she stared at the box waiting for her on the bed. A thought intruded, and she nodded slowly in agreement.

The shirt landed on the floor a moment later, followed by the pants. She knelt before the dresser in her panties, opening the lowest drawer, where deep blue silk lay waiting in a slippery pile. Nearly two months and she hadn't even tried it on yet. But tonight, nothing else would do.

Clarice slipped the nightgown over her head. It slithered downward as she stood, until the edge brushed the tops of her feet. The silk clung to her like a second skin. _Not a bad guess, Doctor._

She settled on the bed and picked up the puzzle box. The exhilaration of a new challenge to conquer and the supple slide of silk against her skin sent a thrill cascading through her senses.

Her fingers explored gently at first. Clarice closed her eyes and gave herself over to feeling, seeking out thin gaps under her fingertips, covering every inch of the smooth surface. Which touch would release a hidden catch?

The first _click_ was a surprise; a gasp of victory passed her lips as she felt the wood give and push out against her hand. She opened her eyes to see a solid pillar of ebony but no secret compartment within. She pressed on.

She found other edges, other possible secrets, but none revealed itself until she hit upon a new method, pressing two points simultaneously. They sank into the box from adjacent faces, pushing a third section outward. This one was red, redder than cherry wood, she thought, though she didn't recognize the type.

Her fingers moved faster now, learning the geography of this new gift, grasping more of its nature and form the longer her hands lingered. Two additional blocks revealed themselves with soft clicks, and she sighed in sympathy with their release.

The fifth click was different. Her fingers shifted three catches at once, triggering something new. This block was larger, hollow, with a thin velvet lining. A slip of cream-colored paper lay inside.

Calming her pulse was a futile endeavor. She plucked the note from its bed and let it unfold in her palm.

**Congratulations, Clarice. I've no doubt you solved the mysteries of your puzzle in short order; I anticipate it will require a lifetime to solve the mysteries of mine, if you'll allow it. – H.**

A throbbing heat rolled through her as she took his meaning. _I'm his puzzle… he wants… his mind… his hands… his complete attention…._

Her eyes closed without her consent as she shuddered. It was after midnight when she finally slept, the puzzle box cradled against her silk-covered stomach, her body curled around it atop the comforter, satisfaction carrying her over into sweet, puzzling dreams.


	15. Chapter 15

**April 18, 1992**

The woman at the front desk made the same cursory check of Clarice's ID as she always did, pushing the clipboard across the counter for the obligatory sign-in. She waved her on with one hand while picking up the phone and punching an extension on speed-dial with the other.

"Hey, it's Nancy at the desk." She laughed. "Right in one. Buzzing her in now."

The door gave its familiar warning as it unlocked, and Clarice stepped through, well accustomed to the hallways and stairwells that led to the basement. By the time she reached the final landing, she could see Barney waiting for her just outside the door to the secure observation room.

"Hey, Barney." She hustled a bit down the steps.

"Afternoon, Clarice." He nodded at her. "How's the foot? Looks like it's feeling better."

"Much, thanks, Barney. The microfractures are healed up, and I haven't lost any flexibility."

"Glad to hear it." He lifted his keys. "Your chair's waiting for you; lemme just get the gate."

She studied him for a moment, realizing for the first time that his… tolerance?… was the closest thing the doctor had to the friendship she shared with Ardelia. Well, had shared, she amended.

"Actually… I was hoping to ask you something, Barney, if you have a minute to spare."

She'd surprised him, that was plain, but he nodded affably. "I can spare a minute, sure."

"You've been helping Dr. Lecter send me things. Why?"

His face slowly slid from a smile to a confused frown.

"Is it bothering you? The stuff he picks? I can stop if it's upsetting you."

She shook her head.

"No, no, that's not what I'm asking, Barney – forget about me for a minute. I mean, why help him in the first place?"

"You mean do I like him, is what you mean. As a person."

"I guess I do kinda mean that." She smiled, a little ruefully. "I'm not trying to get you in trouble or put you in a tough spot or make you break the doctor's confidences, Barney."

The orderly stared at her before he nodded.

"No, I suppose you aren't. Didn't think you would." He shrugged. "He asked a favor, the first time, and, well, he doesn't ask for much. You treat him right and he treats you right. Doesn't make the job hard, you know?" He lowered his voice. "If there's trouble, it comes from upstairs."

"The director still hasn't returned his things – the papers, the books, the drawings," Clarice observed.

"It's petty, mean behavior, like kids in the schoolyard." Barney's expression conveyed the look of one quite familiar with the petty squabbles of young bullies. "It's true he's done bad things; I know, I've seen what he can do."

Clarice's mind flashed on the picture of the nurse Director Chilton had shown her all those months ago. The doctor could inflict carnage when he chose; she knew she'd do well to remember that. Barney continued on, oblivious to her distraction.

"He's here for a reason, sure; he's dangerous, and they say he's crazy. But he's still a man. Treat him like a monster and he'll act like one. Treat him like a man, and he's… well, I guess pleasant maybe isn't the right word, but you've talked to him, you know what I mean."

Charismatic, she thought. Compelling. Intense.

"So when the doctor wants to chat with his lawyer, I make sure he gets his phone call. And when he wants to send you a letter, I bring him the felt pen and the paper and try not to intrude on his thoughts. The director has to allow it because of the lawyer stuff, but nobody else wants to treat him like a person."

"With dignity," she mused.

At that, Barney finally smiled again. "Exactly. You get it; I knew you did the first day you came. And when you came back to thank him for his help, I knew you were good people. But if the gifts bother you—"

"Not at all, Barney." Clarice reached out her hand and squeezed his forearm briefly. "I just… I'm glad you're here. Thanks."

He looked as though he still wasn't quite sure why she'd asked, but the nice thing about Barney was that he wouldn't poke his nose into private business. It would have been rude.

Instead, he lifted the keys again. "Ready?"

"As I ever am."

* * *

><p><strong>April 18, 1992<strong>

She carried herself with confidence today. Her posture was relaxed and open, untroubled by outside concerns. He had not seen Clarice Starling so… _something_… before. He couldn't quite put his finger on the difference, though, until his finger gave him the answer.

Well, fingers, plural, to be precise.

She was staring. Subtly, with short flickering glances, as though her eyes merely moved around her field of vision at random – but they consistently returned to his hands.

He clasped them behind his back and found that while her full attention graced his face, her own finger and thumb rubbed against one another in a seemingly unconscious desire for contact. Curious, he rested his hands atop each other against his stomach instead, fingers splayed.

Her eyes followed the movement. Her tongue briefly wet her lips as he casually stretched, first curling and then flexing his hands.

He stilled as he recognized the difference in her aspect. It had been years since a woman had regarded him thus. She was no longer tentative, in denial, or merely curious. She was confident, expectant… _aware_.

His puzzle was unlocking herself. He was quite pleased to witness the transformation.

"—so the seventh, well, sixth, if you discount the fourth, which they should, but haven't, was found in Denver."

"Yet you aren't carrying a case file today, Clarice."

"Yeah, well, that's because the team is 'pursuing other leads' and our profile is probably sitting in a box."

She was frustrated, resentful, and not trying to hide it from him. No question as to why – more women would die while Jack Crawford's team ignored her insights. She was quite gifted, truly, needing only the structure of give-and-take to sharpen her intuition and instinct into actionable information.

The plight of the future victims did not concern him, but he expected it would haunt Clarice nightly. He could easily envision a future in which case after case beat her down, dulling the ambition in her eyes and the wit in her brain. The simple answer, of course, was to separate her from the FBI before that could occur.

"And why is that, Clarice?"

She sighed.

"Too many reasons, Doctor. Because I'm not officially on the team, because Mr. Crawford asked me, because I'm a woman, because I'm working with you…." She spread her hands. "Maybe because they just doubt the validity of our conclusions." But she frowned, then, clearly disbelieving her own statement.

"Come now, Clarice, you don't believe that at all."

"No."

"Is it instinct or evidence that tells you so?"

"A bit of both, actually, Doctor."

He locked down the anger before she could see it. Evidence meant one or more of the pitiful excuses for investigators in Jackie-boy's division had said or done something hurtful or demeaning. Her even tone suggested it no longer bothered her, if ever it had.

"Then you know why they ignore your insights."

Her eyes drifted to his hands and lingered there, unfocused. It took no great leap of logic, no spark of intuition to tell him why.

"Do you regret it, Clarice?"

She flinched despite, or perhaps because of, his soft tone. Slowly, so slowly he felt a twitch of unexpected anxiety in his mind, she shook her head.

"No." Her voice was quiet but firm. "Even if I had known the way they would look at me, the words they would whisper behind my back and to my face… no, Doctor. I wouldn't change things. I wouldn't wish Mr. Crawford hadn't sent me here."

He allowed the merest sliver of pleasure to show on his face.

"Nor would I, Clarice."

* * *

><p><strong>May 9, 1992<strong>

The seat beside her was empty again.

The doctor had chosen an evening performance at the symphony this time – and sent along a dress, and shoes, and a hired car as he had for the ballet. She needed only to sit and enjoy the music.

For a woman accustomed to handling everything on her own – to needing to scrape and fight for anything she wanted – it was… comforting… to leave it all in his hands. Not at first, of course; no, she had fought this, too, felt ill at ease at the thought of giving up control of even the tiniest portion of her life.

And yet here she sat, listening to Itzhak Perlman play Tchaikovsky on one of the most wonderful-sounding violins in the world, with the National Symphony Orchestra behind him. It was beautiful, masterful, and something she would never have experienced had she not allowed the doctor some leeway to direct her life.

She had thought, before, as Ardelia no doubt still thought now, that she had changed her behavior to please the doctor. She had thought that she had done these things for his benefit only, that she was right to fear that impulse, that she was right to be angry at her loss of control.

But as she listened to the music in the nearly filled concert hall, an idea struck her. She had been looking at the situation backwards. She was not the supplicant in this odd partnership; she could refuse, at any time, for any reason or none at all, to see him, to speak to him, to accept his gifts and demands on her time.

_She_ wasn't trying to please _him_; _he_ was trying to please _her_ – and he was succeeding. It was an astonishing revelation, obvious in hindsight, but previously hidden from her conscious mind.

The music, a Brahms sonata now, seemed to be opening new pathways in her mind, flooding her with thoughts that felt so familiar that she couldn't possibly be having them for the first time, and yet she knew she had never thought them, never known them.

Was it… not a game? Was he in earnest? He had told her, again and again, hadn't he, in his way? But she hadn't recognized it for what it was. She had written off every gesture, rationalized it away as something else, as mere play – image rather than substance.

Adolescent fumblings and college hookups hadn't prepared her for his courteous attention. She'd had no significant lovers, no relationships that persisted more than three or four months. She'd been busy with schoolwork, driven to succeed, and maintaining a relationship hardly seemed worth the time and effort.

_Except with him. You've let him take up your time, take over your thoughts, for months now._

That was true. She even had a surprise to bring along on her next visit, a recording she had made of the talented music students whose enthusiastic practicing often ran over into her own hour. She'd taken the time and trouble to get their cooperation, borrowed equipment from the Bureau, stayed late in the tech lab to put together the cassette… because, as she had at Christmas, she wanted to reciprocate some of the pleasure he'd been bringing her.

_Because you know nothing will ever come of it. This relationship, whatever it is, can't develop. He's in there, and you're out here. It's a fantasy, Clarice. A safe, never-going-to-happen fantasy._

That was true, too.

But it didn't account for the ache she felt every time she caught the empty seat in the corner of her eye.


	16. Chapter 16

**May 16, 1992**

Dark blue denim and a deep green sweater showed off her shapely form. No coat today; she carried the warmth and freshness of spring in her smile and the scent of almonds in her hair.

"Good afternoon, Clarice."

She set her bag down gently beside the waiting chair.

"Hello, Doctor." Her head tilted; his eyes were drawn to the pearls he had given her as they shifted against her throat. A soft smile crossed her face. "I thought about wearing the dress today, but I wouldn't want to embarrass you by being overdressed."

"Mmm. Indeed, you far outclass my own shabby garments no matter what you choose to wear, Clarice." He wondered if the sweater - cotton, it appeared, not wool - felt as soft as her skin.

"Still, it's a beautiful dress, Doctor. Though I don't know when I'll have another chance to wear it."

Was she hinting at a request to attend more performances? No, not Clarice, he thought; she was hardly one to play the coquette. Her statement was nothing more than a practical, factual comment reflecting her mindset.

"Nonsense, my dear. Every woman ought to have a little black dress."

Her dubious expression revealed how she felt about that, but high fashion and society events were not de rigueur for the social class of her birth. She would learn to expect such things for herself, or - better still - she would defer to his expertise in these matters and allow him the joy of spoiling her for years to come.

"If you say so, Doctor. The performance was amazing; I'm sorry you couldn't hear it, too."

"Not to worry, Clarice. I had occasion to hear Mr. Perlman perform many years ago now. His command of music and emotion is quite lovely, as you say."

"It's different, being in the audience. I mean, I listen to music when I run, but it's not the same."

"You're quite correct, Clarice; it's not the same. The notes by themselves may be beautiful, but the experience of sharing them is powerful. The crowd, enveloped by emotion, the performer, fueled by their desire and his own... there is a singular magic created in each moment of a live performance that cannot be duplicated, an ephemeral mood that dissipates with the final note, never to return."

She was watching him intently, her face thoughtful, pensive, perhaps.

"The music is different every time it's played."

He inclined his head in agreement.

"And the more... receptive... the audience, the more powerful the performance?"

"An astute observation, Clarice." He smiled at her, and she mirrored his movement. She might, in time, recognize that the observation applied to more than music; his performance for her was naturally enhanced by her own willingness to be receptive to his overtures. Their interactions had become more powerful over the past year, and he was not fool enough to credit his own perception for that growth; no, it was owing to Clarice Starling's willingness to accept him in more and more areas of her life.

"Well... I don't have anything quite so powerful to offer, Doctor, but I did bring along some music, if you'll indulge me."

"A recording from the symphony, Clarice?"

She shook her head and knelt to dig into her handbag.

"Not exactly. You've been sharing your favorite musical styles with me, Doctor; I thought I'd return the favor."

How intriguing. Was he to be subjected to the noise that passed for musical genius in the modern era? Or perhaps a pops concert, the pandering of orchestras to the American appetite for show tunes and popular music over true classics? It was only fair that her own interests be given equal airtime, he supposed, though clearly she had not suffered through his selections. Still, her music would give him a deeper insight into her personality through what she chose to share with him.

"I'm giddy with anticipation, my dear."

She laughed.

"You think it's going to be awful, and you're considering whether you can get away with disappearing into your head for a while."

_Getting more perceptive all the time, are we, Clarice? Though I would never choose to "disappear," as you say, in your presence._

"Hardly that, Clarice. Such rudeness would be unbecoming between friends. We are friends, are we not?"

She paused, cassette in hand, music player waiting patiently on the chair.

"Something like that, Doctor. I'm not sure there's a word for what we are."

_Deliciously ambiguous, my dear._

The cassette slid into place, the door closing with a click, and Clarice pulled the chair a bit closer to his cell.

"Just give it a shot, Doctor. If you don't like it, I promise I won't make you listen to the whole thing."

She pressed a button and shifted backward until her side brushed the glass of his cell. As at Christmas, she angled her body toward the end of the hall nearest them, her back to the rest of the ward.

_Creating a sense of privacy, Clarice? Do you imagine we sit side by side in a concert hall, hmm?_

The thought pleased him, warmed him as he settled beside her on the cold floor and waited for the music to begin.

His head turned sharply at the first notes; he noted that she was watching him with some amusement. The tune wasn't one he had heard before, but the players... violin, two perhaps, and cello, if he wasn't mistaken.

The notes were frenetic, pounding; the performers clearly had poured a great deal of energy into their work. The fingering and bowing would require sustained, rapid movement. He began to recognize the rhythm of it, to sense when the piece would come back around; it was a repetitive piece with little significant variation.

Still, it was not at all what he had expected.

The piece came to a crescendo and abruptly ended. Clarice reached out and paused the playback.

"Another, Doctor, or was that too much for your delicate ears?"

"A trio, Clarice? Violins and cello? What do you call the piece? I confess, I am not familiar with the composer."

She nodded; her teeth peeked out from between her lips as she tugged the lower one into her mouth. Trying - and failing - to hide her smile, he expected.

"Yeah, two violins and a cello. It's, uh, 'Rock You Like a Hurricane' by the Scorpions. I'm not sure I'd call them composers, though." She stretched out her arm again, her finger hovering over the button. "Not so bad, then?"

"I'll reserve judgment until I've heard more. One sample is hardly enough for a thorough analysis."

"Of course, Doctor." Her finger pressed the button. "You just let me know when you've had enough."

The next tune seemed to mimic a swiftly moving mountain stream at first, eventually slowing a bit until the rapids returned. It was a lengthy piece, racing to its end only after several minutes had passed. "The Final Countdown," Clarice named it when asked.

A sharp, almost violent piece was next; strident, piercing, but rather moving, he thought. He admitted it might have some merit, which made Clarice laugh. At his inquiry, she confessed, still laughing, to the title: "Smooth Criminal."

He smiled, finding her amusement endearing, even at his expense.

She played nearly two dozen songs in all, flipping the cassette over midway through the performance. The hissing of the empty tape cut off with a click as it reached the end.

"Well, Doctor? Is my musical taste as terrible as you predicted?"

She was quite satisfied with herself, he noted, and playful with it. _Mmm. Would that I could show you how much I enjoy you at play, my dear._

"It was quite the interesting concert, Clarice, and not terrible, no."

"I thought it suited... _us_." She rushed onward in her explanation, as though to hide the suggestion that there was such a pairing in which one word could encompass them both. "It's all rock and metal and punk and pop, just reinterpreted for string lovers with more classical sensibilities."

"Ah. How clever of them to have discovered a way to make intolerable music palatable to the ear."

She rolled her eyes, a gesture he would have found disdainfully rude from anyone else, but she smiled as she did so. Her shoulder lightly bumped the glass between them. "Can't just say you liked it, can you?"

"I'm quite pleased that you shared it with me, Clarice."

More than the music, though, he was pleased with the direction of her thoughts. She had taken the initiative to fuse their interests, his in classical music and hers in modern music - a precursor, at least subconsciously, to fusing their lives. Aware of it or not, she had been thinking about how they might fit together. That thought pleased him more than any music could.

He made a mental note to consider the design of their future music room; an open, bright space, with high ceilings... he left off such fanciful imaginings as she leaned her head against the glass.

Though the music had ended several minutes before, Clarice had shown no inclination to move away. He returned to the conversation.

"You attended this performance, Clarice? How did you discover such a charming musical mix?"

At that, she hesitated, her amusement fading. She pulled back and turned her head to look directly in his face as she replied.

"I don't want to lie to you, Doctor."

A perplexing response, to be sure. He was careful to maintain a neutral tone and expression.

"And do you feel you must, on this subject?"

"I can't answer your question, Doctor."

"Cannot or will not, Clarice?"

Hints of anger and panic in her gaze; agitation in the way her index finger twitched against her knee as it rested against the glass. The movement appeared similar to a trigger pull, which he expected was a soothing release for her, a calming motion. Although, he reflected, it was also not unlike the movements for... _a string player_. _Fascinating._

Had she recorded the music at a lesson? He surreptitiously studied her fingertips - a touch dull, slightly rougher than the skin surrounding them, but no true calluses, which likely ruled out guitar. Had she gone classical, then? Was that her on the tape, playing with others? Her head shifted again as she considered his question, and a minute change in skin tone called his attention.

There, on the left side of her neck, the lightest flush of red. Not so noticeable as a rash, but unmistakable at this distance, when only inches separated them. _The violin_. And she'd given it a great deal of practice recently to acquire a vibratory blush.

"Will not," she finally acknowledged.

"And if I persist, Clarice? Will you lie to me then?"

It took her a moment to come to it, but she eventually shook her head.

"Ah. The silent treatment, Clarice? I thought you beyond grade-school pettiness, but perhaps-"

"Stop, Doctor. I'm using my free pass." Her voice was firm, commanding; he thought she might do well with it at work if the ineffective paper-pushers ever put her in charge of something. "I don't want to hear more questions on the subject, and you're not to needle me about it."

"Of course, Clarice. I quite understand the agreement." The agreement, yes, but her strange insistence, that she should waste such a thing on a trivial matter... _clearly, it is not so trivial to her. Why? Perhaps... perhaps she does not wish to share. Something for herself only, and I am intruding._ Though he was pleased to find her developing her interests and hobbies outside the FBI, he was forced to quell the dismay it brought him to know that she was deliberately shutting him out.


	17. Chapter 17

**June 3, 1992**

Clarice smothered a yawn with one hand and poured herself another cup of coffee with the other. She'd spent an overnight shift on surveillance and ducked back into the office to file the paperwork, but it was nearing noon now and her energy was flagging.

Footsteps signaled another agent's entrance to the break room. Too tired to mumble a greeting, Clarice kept pouring. A mistake, as it turned out, when a too-casual shove caused her to stumble and sent coffee rolling across the counter and down the cabinet to the floor.

"The hell?" She jumped back from the splash and swung around. Agent Davies. Of course.

"You seem a little twitchy there, Clare. Long night screwing your prison buddy?"

The coffeepot was still in her hand. It took considerable effort not to swing it at his head. _Satisfying in the moment, detrimental in the long run._

"Davies. Shouldn't you be busy chasing your serial killer? How many months has it been now?"

"Shouldn't you be busy fucking yours?" He stepped closer, his shoulder nearly brushing hers. "You know, if rubbing against the glass isn't getting it done for you, there's no shortage of guys here who'd step up."

"You offering?" She set the coffeepot on the counter behind her without looking; better to take away the temptation before she really did swing it at him.

"I wouldn't say no." His smile was more predatory than enticing, though she doubted he knew the difference – and it made his pinched little face look like a rabid gerbil.

"I would. And human resources is just gonna love handling all the paperwork I'm going to file if you pull this shit again." From the look on his face, she thought perhaps her predatory smile was more effective than his. "So maybe you wanna rethink your attitude and get back to your case. What's it now, eight bodies? Oh, no, wait – you still think it's nine, don't you? Those women deserve better than the half-assed ideas you dream up when you aren't playing with your dick."

She shoved past him, relishing the sight of him stumbling back as she walked out. Without her coffee, dammit, but with a healthy cup of self-respect.

* * *

><p><strong>June 16, 1992<strong>

The package wedged in the front door was large, more than a foot wide and perhaps two and a half feet high, but thin – four inches deep at most. Clarice tried to hoist it by one hand with care; surprised by the stiffness and the weight, she was forced to unlock the door first and use two hands to carry it inside.

She left the package propped against her coffee table, her fingers tingling with excitement, and ate a quick dinner standing at the kitchen sink. No doubt the doctor would have told her that meals deserved to be lingered over and savored, she thought, but it was unlikely the doctor had eaten many fast-food dinners. _It's a safe bet he doesn't linger over the food they serve at the asylum, either._

Dinner took ten minutes, fifteen at the most, before Clarice tossed the remains in the trash and disappeared into her living room. The brown paper wrapping beckoned insistently. Her knuckles knocked against the edge, returning a deep _thunk_ unlike any of the previous packages.

_That's… odd. _

The paper tore off easily, leaving her with a wooden crate of some sort, a cream-colored envelope attached to its front. Block letters printed on the crate indicated the top edge and clasps to be removed for opening. Clarice stared at the box, an inkling of its contents stirring in her mind even as her hands pulled off the envelope and opened it.

**Dear Clarice,**

**You're in danger of becoming dreadfully dull, you know. A woman consumed by her career, at your age? For shame.**

**Perhaps you have gotten what you want from me and now wish to end our association. It seems you prefer the company of dullards.**

**As you read this letter, Clarice, it has been a year and a day since first you began your little visits. Tell me, do you feel as though you've been stolen away to a fairy realm? Does Uncle Jack hover outside the circle, waiting to pull you back? **

**Or was this a handfasting, Clarice? Either party might sever ties before the end of the day without fault. Shall I expect you Saturday, or will you be courting some new stepping-stone on your path to professional success? **

**Perhaps instead you see yourself as a serf in servitude to Uncle Jack. Will you be freed of my presence and elevated to a higher status now that your year and a day is up? Has your position in Behavioral Science finally materialized? **

**No… I think not, Clarice. I think that door will remain forever closed to you. A pity, that it is the only dream you will chase. **

**Cordially,**

**Hannibal Lecter, M.D.**

**P.S. I thought the painting particularly apropos, Clarice, though you yourself might disagree. Tell me, which half of your life is light and which darkness?**

Perplexed, and feeling more than a bit slighted, Clarice turned the clasps on the crate and pulled away the wooden cover. Stripping off layers of bubble wrap and some kind of semi-transparent paper revealed an oil painting on canvas. A dark-haired woman in a blue silk gown gazed back at her.

The woman clutched a fruit in her left hand; her right gripped her wrist in a shackling embrace. The woman's stare was distant – pensive, sad… _despairing. Wherever she is, she wants to escape._

Frowning, Clarice glanced at the doctor's postscript again. The painting – a reproduction, she presumed, though perhaps there was a card somewhere in the packaging to tell her more – seemed vaguely familiar. She wasn't one for browsing art galleries, which meant it had to have come from the art history class she'd taken to fulfill a requirement in college. _Half in light, half in darkness… the fruit… are those… seeds?_

"Persephone," she murmured. "No, not quite, but some other name for the same mythological figure…."

It came to her then, as she let her mind tug on the thread of thought.

"Rossetti. _Proserpine._"

She curled her legs under her in the chair and studied the painting, her thoughts tumbling through the doctor's questions.

_What if he's grown bored with me? Is he casting himself as Hades in this drama? Nothing's ever that simple with him._

But she couldn't shake the loneliness that settled around her like a shroud.

* * *

><p><strong>June 18, 1992<strong>

Jack Crawford was looking over paperwork at his desk when Clarice ducked in for her chat – the official unofficial monthly update on the "Lecter Project," as he termed it; she was not nearly so formal in her own mind. But today it wasn't the doctor or his latest gift that she wanted to discuss.

"Heard you got the serial out west, sir." She sat without waiting to be asked.

He leaned back in his chair, tipping the folder on his desk closed.

"Lucky break. The victim drew attention at a gas station by kicking out the taillight from inside the trunk, and a Good Samaritan called it in." His glance was apologetic. "It was a good profile, Starling; we just didn't have the manpower to pursue every angle."

"And my angle didn't rank nearly as high as the ones from the guys sitting at the table."

It was a more unforgiving tone than she really ought to take with her prospective boss, Clarice knew, but eight innocent women had died. Another was still recovering from the trauma – and the FBI hadn't done a damn thing to save her. She had done it herself. The information had been available, and the Behavioral Science team had shunted it to the background because they didn't like the source.

"You'll get there, Starling. You're earning a seat at that table. It doesn't come overnight."

_It would if you requested my reassignment. But you haven't. Because the doctor's right? Because you're afraid… afraid that I'm not afraid? Afraid that I'm like him?_

"Of course, sir." She smiled, a thin smile that communicated her dissatisfaction with the status quo more than her agreement. "I know I'll have to work for it."

_And that you'll continue ignoring my work as long as you think I'm… tainted. _

Which meant she needed to give some serious thought to the idea of ending this… whatever it was… with Hannibal Lecter. She held herself quite still to avoid giving Crawford even a glimpse of the panic that idea ignited. It was ironic, she thought, that giving up her talks with the man whose insights could best help her close cases might be the only way to ensure her place on the team working those cases.

"Well, you made a good start with that profile. It was sharp work, Starling."

Now he was just pandering to her ego. She didn't need that, not from him; if he'd truly thought her insights were so perceptive, he'd have pushed the team harder in that direction.

"Thank you, sir. It helps to have access to someone intimately familiar with a murderous mindset." A touch unsubtle, she knew, but she'd learned over the last year that Hannibal Lecter was the one subject guaranteed to agitate and unsettle Jack Crawford. And it was amusing to see him squirm.

"Right. Lecter." He made the same face he always did at the mention of the man's name, an attempt at blankness that never failed to show his distaste. "Your project has survived longer than I expected, Starling. Though he seemed a bit restrained in his most recent letter. You trying to teach him manners? Or is he just cooling toward you?"

She shrugged, though the possibility had certainly occurred to her, with no small amount of accompanying distress.

"I told you it was never me he was obsessed with, sir. Maybe he's just changing his strategy to provide himself with new amusements."

"You mean maybe he's realized that he can't charm you away from your duties."

"Something like that, sir."

The talk moved along other lines then, but Jack Crawford's words stayed with her. Midnight found her staring at the ceiling above her bed, wondering if, just maybe, it wasn't possible for the doctor to succeed in charming her away.


	18. Chapter 18

**June 20, 1992**

"Our profile was right, Doctor." Clarice seated herself swiftly, looking up at him as he watched her from the edge of the glass. "And Jack Crawford thinks you're losing interest in me."

She seemed unaffected by her mentor's pronouncement, perhaps even a touch disdainfully amused. The doctor raised an eyebrow in query.

"Uncle Jack's thoughts are hardly any concern of mine, Clarice. Tell me, do _you_ think I am 'losing interest' in you?"

"I'd have to have reason to believe you were interested in me before in order to believe you were losing that interest, Doctor." Her gaze challenged him, though her amusement lingered. "Care to confirm or deny?"

She projected a surprising amount of confidence; his fledgling was beginning to know her own worth in his eyes.

"You wish me to be direct, Clarice?" He allowed heat to seep into his gaze and his slight smile. "That seems a trifle unwise at this juncture, don't you agree?"

She tipped her head back and forth as though weighing the idea. "A girl likes to hear these things, Doctor, or so I'm told."

A fascinating admission; truly, had no man yet conveyed his admiration for her myriad wonders?

"Surely one of your former conquests would have admitted such, Clarice."

She laughed, nearly guffawing before she brought herself under control.

"I think you have an inflated sense of my previous conquests, Doctor."

"Now, Clarice, you simply cannot make me believe that you have not had men falling at your feet."

"Leering and tripping over themselves, maybe, Doctor, but hardly admitting to an undying love. I've instituted a strict look but don't touch policy for the most part."

"Why, then, I'm quite the safe choice, am I not?" He tapped his fingers against the glass, peering at them with feigned thoughtfulness. "I believe I meet the qualification."

"Except, of course, that you're losing interest in me." Her smile was wry.

"Ah, yes, of course. Except for that. Is that the message you took from my letter, Clarice?"

"Now that's an interesting question. Superficially, I'd have to say you were upset – even angry – with me when you wrote it. That's the impression that Mr. Crawford got, certainly. But even if you were, Doctor, I doubt you'd let it color your correspondence so obviously, which means the whole thing was for his benefit, not mine. So why do you want Mr. Crawford to think we're having a fight?"

"Can you not think of a reason, Clarice?"

"It's a fiction, a cover story, clearly, but I don't see why it's necessary. That you think it is implies we have something to hide."

"Despite your excellent profile, you have not yet gained the position in Behavioral Science you seek, correct?"

Her eyes narrowed and unfocused. She was, he presumed, ascertaining the nature of the connection between his question and the current discussion topic. It was merely a moment before she began to articulate her thought process. He rather enjoyed it when she worked out ideas aloud; it was akin to strolling through her mind hand in hand. _A lovely place to visit._

"Mr. Crawford has been… concerned… about what he perceives to be your obsession with me ever since you started sending gifts. But it wasn't until the last few months that he's been particularly concerned with how I'm handling it… as if he's lost faith in my abilities."

She stood and began to pace slowly. He allowed himself a single glance at her stride, her muscles bunching and flexing as she moved. He knew her to be a runner, but she paced with such a graceful economy of movement that he ached to partner her on the dance floor. _Would you trust me to lead, Clarice, or would you fight against it still?_

"No… not my abilities… it's more that he's never known anyone to spend so much time in your company and not come away damaged. He thinks there's something wrong with me that I'm not… disturbed." She tugged at her lip with her teeth, nodding to herself. "I haven't told you, but you're familiar with how Mr. Crawford operates and his opinion of you… you're heading off future trouble by giving him the idea that I've done something to displease you, that I'm not as young and impressionable, as malleable, as he expects you would hope."

She stopped pacing and turned, her body only inches from the glass, from him.

"You feigned a snit for my benefit, Doctor."

"Brava, Clarice." He smiled, showing his teeth. "I believe, as usual, you've answered your own question."

* * *

><p><strong>July 7, 1992<strong>

The doctor's latest gift was heavy for its size. Given the shape of the package, Clarice was jokingly laying odds on a gold bar or two.

She took a sip of her wine – a fine red, but undoubtedly nothing the doctor would drink, given that she'd picked it up at the grocery store – and set the glass back on the coffee table. The package waited in her lap, one hand lying protectively atop the familiar brown wrapping paper.

Stripping away the outer layer revealed a silver box. Clarice pulled off the top without delay, curiosity overriding the joy of anticipation. Her fingers curled around the cream-colored envelope inside, beneath which lay a wooden box. _Another puzzle, Doctor?_

No, this box was hinged at the back, she saw. A keepsake box of some kind. Its top was flat, smooth, with no design of any kind. It gave away nothing.

She opened the envelope first.

**Dear Clarice,**

**You wound me, my dear. Such a dangerous beauty must be kept out of reach, hmm? **

**You are, after all, quite sharp – and quite lethal. Ought I to fear for my safety in your presence? **

**Ah, well. Sometimes one must grasp life by the blade. **

**With all due courtesy,**

**Hannibal Lecter, M.D.**

"Still playing games with Jack Crawford, Doctor? I suppose straightforward would be too much to ask for in this instance." _And not nearly as much fun._

She raised the wooden box out of the package and tipped the lid back. The block nestled in the velvet lining was glass, not gold, but it was merely a casing for the object within. _Is that how you see me, Doctor?_

Clarice sat, and sipped her wine, and pondered a sharp, dangerous beauty.

* * *

><p><strong>July 13, 1992<strong>

"Lab identified the knife in the paperweight." Jack Crawford pushed a page across his desk. Clarice took it and scanned the contents.

The wicked talon encased in glass was a Spyderco Harpy. Serrated steel blade. Stainless steel handle. A folding knife, though it lay unfurled in its protective bed.

She slid the paper back across the desk.

"You'd tell me if you felt this was a threat directed at you, Starling, wouldn't you?" The question had an edge to it, a reminder that he held some authority over her, even if outside her direct chain of command.

"Actually, sir, I thought perhaps he was mocking what he sees as my misguided attachment to the FBI."

"Explain."

"Dr. Lecter obeys no external authority; he abhors the very idea of giving such decision-making power to others. His letter implies that I am the knife, but he sends it encased in glass, unable to function. Its edge is dulled, its danger diminished, by its surroundings."

It was a tricky line to walk, she knew, but her safest move was to tell mostly truth… and to do so in such a way that Jack Crawford thought it only the twisted lie of a madman.

"I think, sir, that he has accepted that he cannot" – she waved her hand as though plucking a word from midair – "_woo_ me away from the FBI and now seeks to persuade me that I am like him in some way. He thinks if he can get me to smash the glass, metaphorically speaking, he'll have 'freed' me from what he considers my ethical confinement by the badge I carry."

She tipped her head to the side and raised a skeptical eyebrow.

"Of course, we both know _his_ ethics are suspect at best." _Or not fully understood._

But her small lie had served its purpose; Crawford actually chuckled. When he stopped, he eyed her appraisingly.

"I was wrong before, Starling. You're sharpening your instincts as an investigator with this little project. Keep it up."

She left the office wondering whether her supposedly sharper instincts were getting more of a workout playing with the doctor or dancing around Mr. Crawford's questions.

* * *

><p><strong>July 18, 1992<strong>

Clarice thoroughly inspected the metal chair waiting for her, a ritual she had completed near the start of each visit for more than a year now. Her persistence was rather… endearing.

She trusted Barney, the doctor was certain, but she refused to put the orderly in the position of possibly refusing a command from Dr. Chilton. He was positive she knew Barney could see her on the security camera as she searched for listening devices. Whether she knew it or not, her actions already had protected their privacy.

As Barney had relayed to him one night many months ago, the asylum director had indeed suggested eavesdropping on their meetings. Security reasons, of course. Once apprised of Clarice's repeated precautions, however, he had reluctantly backed away from the proposal.

The doctor offered a polite smile as Clarice returned her attention to him.

"Still afraid your impassioned declarations of love will be overheard?"

"If I made them, he'd probably sell them to the Tattler." She raised an eyebrow, daring him to disagree. "I don't like that smarmy little lizard, Doctor, and neither do you, so let's not pretend otherwise."

"Hmm. He did once do me the courtesy of pointing out your little game, Clarice, though courtesy was not his purpose."

She studied him, perhaps attempting to determine if her previous deception needled him or if – as she no doubt suspected – _he_ was simply needling _her_.

He could see it when she made the conscious decision to shrug off the accusation. Her head moved in minute negation before she spoke.

"I suppose, Doctor, that you must be correct to fear for your safety in my presence. I am a known liar, after all. Should I wave to Barney to come sit in on our chat? He might be willing to call the director, if you like; I'd bet a pretty penny that he'd haul ass out here on a Saturday if it meant fodder for an article on his most famous resident."

"A thoughtful offer, Clarice. You are, of course, quite terrifying." His statement contained more truth than he anticipated ever sharing with her, even were they to spend the next forty years together. Much as he enjoyed playing with his lovely Starling, he was keenly aware of the dangers she posed. Already she consumed his thoughts; what else might she take from him?

She leaned toward the glass, her eyes sweeping over him.

"I don't see any trembling, Doctor, despite your fear."

He concealed his smile at her reference to his earlier letter.

"Society has seen fit to protect me from predators such as yourself, Clarice." He rapped his knuckles on the glass. "The accommodations leave something to be desired, I'll grant you, but I trust I am perfectly safe from your designs on my person."

Her eyes widened, he noted, but she continued playing.

"So I have designs on your person now, do I, Doctor?" She stepped closer, bringing her fingers to rest against the glass opposite his own hand. "I think you have that backwards."

"Ah, I see." He dipped his head in a pantomime of sorrow. "You've lost interest in me."

She closed her eyes when she laughed, lashes brushing against her cheeks. Once opened, they revealed softness… affection… a deep vulnerability, if he had read her aright. Her expression turned serious; her voice was hardly more than a whisper, and strongly flavored with the rural accent of her birthplace.

"I don't think that's possible, Doctor." Was that… shyness? He had seen avoidance, reluctance, even stubborn denial written on her face before, but this was something new. A new facet of her growing awareness? Of her, dare he say, acceptance? "I won't try an' categorize it, so don't you ask, but I… I do take an interest, Doctor."

His thumb rubbed slowly over the glass between them as though it caressed her palm.

"I know, Clarice." He kept his voice low, soothing her with his tone as much as his words. "You needn't be in a rush to define things so specifically. There are times when a guess is all the knowledge one can handle."

Her eyes grew distant. His message had resonated with her, vibrated some string he could not yet see. A smile touched her lips. Her eyes returned to the moment and sought out his own.

"There are times, Doctor, when a guess is a perfect fit."

His eyes flashed as he took her meaning; he judged it time to change the thrust of the conversation before it ventured into territory best left for a day when glass no longer stood between them. But long after she had departed, after the lights had been lowered and the hall had grown quiet, Hannibal Lecter lay on his bunk with his hands folded atop his chest and thought of his alternately shy and bold Clarice draped in a perfectly fitted nightgown of blue silk.


	19. Chapter 19

**July 31, 1992**

Clarice swayed lightly as she played the closing notes of Bach's Sarabande in D minor. The fingering was a bit complex at times - less so now that her movements weren't quite so rusty - and she was pleased to have gotten through it without dropping a note or needing to pause to adjust her positioning.

Despite the sarabande's origins in transgressive, romantic dance, Bach's reconfiguration of it here left her feeling melancholy and disconnected. There were moments of fleeting joy, quick notes sprinkled within, but it always put her in mind of a child's laughter at a funeral. Not her own; no, she had been solemn at Daddy's service and burial, dry-eyed and numb, but among the saddened murmur of voices had been the buoyant giggles of neighbors' toddlers, children too young to understand mourning.

The sarabande spoke to her sense of separation, of isolation, and it was for that reason that she had chosen it for her surprise concert. She already planned to tease him first with the melody line from something more cheerful; the sarabande would be her second piece. She was almost ready. She could feel it, the comfort as she played now, the constant noise of her mind silenced.

She shuffled the pages in front of her, more a security blanket than a necessity at this point, and started practicing the third piece. Her first pick was meant merely to amuse; her second was a... guess... that he, too, shared her sense of isolation. But the third... the third yearned. Tchaikovsky, the violin solo from _Swan Lake _as Odette danced her story for her prince.

Melancholy, still, and doomed, though that, too, seemed to suit their odd friendship. But Odette's tale was one of bondage and betrayal and a soul-deep yearning for freedom. Her prince listened; he provided support. He fell in love.

Clarice knew that yearning. She felt it, daily, though she couldn't always put her finger on its source. The doctor listened to her, and he supported her, and he... loved her? Was that too far-fetched to be believed?

The knock at the door came just after she had started her second play-through. She took a moment to lay the violin and bow gently in their case before going to answer it; by the time she opened the door, the delivery woman had already left the package and was climbing back into her car. Clarice waved her thanks and bent down to pick up a new box in a familiar plain brown wrapper.

The package was longer by far than it was wide, and fairly heavy as well. Clarice carried it into her living room and set it down beside the coffee table where her violin case rested. She debated silently before carefully packing away her violin and its accoutrements for the evening. With the package hoisted onto the cleared coffee table, she knelt and reached for the edges of the paper.

Unlike the other gifts, this one's contents were apparent immediately once the wrapping was peeled away. The box proclaimed it to be an excellent telescope for the beginning astronomer, extolling its virtues in an entirely unfamiliar language of millimeters and magnification and mounts.

"Astronomy, Doctor? Do I need a new hobby?" A memory tickled at the edge of thought before it came into focus. The doctor, musing on the difficulties of incarceration: _What I want is a view._

A cream-colored corner peeked out of one end of the box. Clarice opened the flap and set the envelope aside to slide out the shaped foam box protecting the delicate instrument inside. Lifting the foam top revealed a variety of tubes and knobs in silver and black and a fairly fat instruction book.

Clarice raised an eyebrow at the intimidating layout.

"I hope you have a good explanation for this one, Doctor."

The envelope featured the same careful rendering of her given name in its center as the previous ones had done. She smiled with fond affection, irrationally certain she would recognize his handwriting among hundreds of sheets of similar copperplate calligraphy merely from the sense of _presence_ imbued in his script. Seeing her name in his handwriting was the same as hearing her name from his lips. Her mind made no distinction between the two.

She unfolded the letter and began to read.

**Dear Clarice, **

**Tell me, did you ever stargaze as a small child? Even to the naked eye, the night sky is a beautiful sight; I hardly think your father would have turned up his nose at such free entertainment for his bold, inquisitive daughter.**

She paused a moment, lost in the memory of staying up past her bedtime, sharing her father's cookies and lemonade on the rare nights he had off. Fresh-scrubbed and pajama-clad, she curled next to him on the porch swing and watched with wonder as he pointed out constellations and read to her from a library book of related myths. Yes, she had stargazed. Even in Bozeman she had gazed at the stars when the phantom screams of lambs echoed in her dreams and woke her from her slumber. The view didn't feel the same, though, without someone to share it.

**Do you know the story of the constellation Taurus? I refer not to the tawdry tale of Zeus and his theft of Europa – though some say she went willingly, fearlessly – but to the tale of Cerus, the wild and destructive bull. He is powerful, unstoppable, alone – until a slip of a girl comes to him. She calms him. For her, he controls his destructive impulses. He is patient; he is wise. But she is not his, not entirely. The spring and summer are theirs; fall and winter see her carried to the underworld, ruled by the dictates of Hades, while Cerus is compelled to journey across the night sky without her. What joy must he have felt each spring as his hooves finally touched the horizon and joined him once more to Persephone. **

Clarice inhaled sharply.

"You asked me which half of my life was light and which darkness, Doctor. Is that how you see this little drama? Would you cast Mr. Crawford – Behavioral Science – the FBI – as Hades? Are you saying you would… tame yourself? For me?"

It seemed an enormous responsibility, to act as another's conscience. And it wasn't as though he lacked one, she thought; he just drew the lines differently from everyone else.

"Not his conscience, then. Just… a reason to reconsider those lines?"

The notion still made her uneasy in ways she could not articulate, and she let the thought slip into the back of her mind to gestate without her nervous interference.

**Astronomy is a lesson in patience, my dear. The universe moves in its own time, apart from our limited understanding of it. We cannot speed it up; we cannot slow it down. We cannot… reverse it… nor can all the wishing humanity has done since its birth make it so. It is humbling, is it not? **

Her brows drew together, her eyes unfocusing as she considered his meaning. He might expect her to wish for the chance to stop her father from going to work that night or to save the lambs from slaughter… but what would he reverse if he could?

"Who do you need to save, Doctor?"

**You'll have some time, yet, before Cerus-as-Taurus makes his appearance in the night sky. Perhaps you will find other sights, other stories to distract yourself until he begins his journey over the horizon in mid-October. Look to the east, Clarice. The hunter will be close behind, driving Cerus onward with his weapons and his dogs, chasing him westward until he is once more allowed to travel through sunlit meadows with the woman who so captivated him. **

**Indulge me, Clarice. Seek out the beauty that stone walls deny me. **

**Affectionately,**

**Hannibal **

She laid the letter down, rose, and went to the window. It wasn't raining anymore, as it had for most of the evening, but the sky remained shrouded by clouds. Astronomy would have to wait for another night.

Sliding the telescope to the side, Clarice lifted her violin case back to the table and opened the latches. She needed more practice. She was certain, now, that isolation and yearning were two emotions the doctor understood quite well.

* * *

><p><strong>Aug. 11, 1992<strong>

"Looks like you're back in Lecter's good graces, Starling. Planning to slap on a collar and nose ring while he's so docile?"

Jack Crawford appeared amused on the surface – or as amused as he ever looked – but his eyes watched her with suspicion. Clarice shook her head.

"I think that would be a bit premature, sir."

"Oh?" Suspicion became interest, and she realized this was a simplistic test of her gullibility. Mr. Crawford needed to reassure himself again and again that she was not falling under some spell of the doctor's devising.

"The idea that I could somehow 'tame' Hannibal Lecter is laughable, sir. He's trying to feed my ego, to make me feel powerful so he can knock my feet out from under me later." She shrugged. "He has a lot of tools in his psychological warfare kit; it's to be expected that he'll try them all out sooner or later."

"You've been taking this all with remarkable level-headedness, Starling."

Was that a compliment or a concern? Clarice wished she were in a conversation with a man who made more sense. _Like Dr. Lecter? How many times a day do you wish you were talking to him, Clarice? Why not put a phone in his cell and make him No. 1 on your speed dial?_

She smiled. "It's a helpful exercise, sir. I'd definitely say I'm benefiting from the project – being able to distance myself from the subject, questioning motive at every turn, exploring the 'rational' irrationality of the serial killer's mindset… the practical experience is something the academy just can't copy in a classroom setting."

"Good, good." He looked relieved; she must have hit the right notes. "I'll see if I can't throw another case your way soon, Starling. Once you have a track record of success, I'll be able to make some noise and get you down here where you belong."

It was a dismissal; Clarice stood.

"Thank you, sir."

As she headed up to her cubicle for more hours of background checks, she considered whether she was more excited by the prospect of getting a new case or having a reason to make more visits to Baltimore.

* * *

><p><strong>Aug. 15, 1992<strong>

"Taking your cue from gangsters now, are you, Clarice? If that's a Tommy gun in your case, you must be here to bust me out."

"No such luck, Doctor. Though I could probably handle the gun better than the violin."

"Alas, you've dashed my hopes. Perhaps next time instead. I must confess to some measure of curiosity, Clarice. I myself do not play the violin - and I find it highly doubtful good ol' Freddie would allow me one if I did - yet I cannot recall you mentioning that you played an instrument at all. Tell me, my dear, just what else have you been hiding from me?"

"Oh, I think you had some idea, Doctor."

"Mmm. You were rather insistent about not divulging the origin of the charming music you shared with me in May. It did not necessarily follow, however, that you were in training."

He was careful to keep his expression neutral; while it was true that he hadn't known for certain, the slight roughness apparent on the fingertips of her left hand when they caught the light and the faintest shadow of red on the left side of her neck in recent months had, indeed, suggested violin practice.

"You noticed, though." She rubbed her neck lightly. "It was the redness, wasn't it? I tried to avoid practicing too much on the days before my visits, but sometimes the music just... wanted to be heard, I guess."

He was struck by a thought: The impassive expression that worked so easily on others was no longer entirely effective on her, if it had ever truly been. She could read him through it.

"When the music calls, Clarice, the player must answer."

That she had taken up an instrument pleased him, but he had, from her protective behavior on the subject, suspected it was a private pleasure she wished to keep from him. He had not predicted that she would be keeping a secret for _his_ benefit, that she would grace him with a performance - that she had, for months, planned such a thing _simply to please him_. The idea was quite thrilling.

"You're not an easy man to surprise, Doctor."

_Easier than you'd think, Clarice, but only for you._

Aloud, he said only, "Whatever prompted your impulse to try?"

"I wanted you to have new experiences, Doctor. I wanted you to be able to breathe deeply again. When you talked about how your mother played the piano…." She paused, checking his expression, which he kept outwardly unchanged, and hurried along.

"And you make a convincing argument for the superiority of live performances over recordings, despite the chance for imperfections." Her earnest expression slid into a wry grin. "I do hope you'll forgive a few imperfections, Doctor."

The woman had sensed the rawness of his emotion at Christmas and spent the last eight months formulating a plan to create new happy memories for him. Was there anything he wouldn't forgive her? A question to ponder later; for now, Clarice deserved his full attention in the moment.

"A few," he allowed. "Shall we say three?"

"And after that, Doctor?"

"Oh, after that, Clarice, I daresay you'll have to pay for them, won't you?" There was heat in his tone and in his gaze - and in hers, as well, unless he'd misjudged it.

"A forfeit? I don't think I've anything to give you, Doctor."

"Mmm. A future favor, then, Clarice?" He forestalled her objection with a raised hand. "Nothing illegal or objectionable to you; you have my word."

She nodded, slowly. "One forfeit, at a future date, if it's within my power, and still subject to my veto, Doctor."

_A bit controlling are we, Clarice? Well, that could be fun. _

Nevertheless, he accepted her terms. "Very well, my dear. Now, if you please, I find myself quite eager to hear this concert you've been planning in secret for so many months."

She opened the case, removed the violin and bow, and began a simple scale. After a moment, she frowned.

"I forget how damp it is in here sometimes."

She fiddled with the knobs and tried a few notes again. He paid close attention, eyes closed, head tilted to capture the sound. With small movements, she perfected her pitch. He opened his eyes, considering whether to suggest she stop, but she, too, seemingly satisfied with her tuning, adjusted her stance and began to play.

He recognized the tune straightaway. Beethoven. _Ode to Joy. _Not an unusual choice for a beginning student.

Her aspect was lively, her fingers nimble, her bowing sleek. She held her eyes half-closed, and he wondered if she pictured the notes as she played them. Her loveliness pierced him. He burned the image into his mind. Someday, if there were to be a someday, he would commit it to paper and hang it in their music room, forever a reminder of this, her first concert for him.


	20. Chapter 20

**Sept. 18, 1992**

He hadn't sent a letter.

Tomorrow was Saturday, the third Saturday of the month, and Clarice's doorstep was still package-free. He'd waited until the last moment once before, on Valentine's Day, but today had no such significance.

"Guess he didn't like the concert." She stood at the window, sipped her wine, watched the rain beating down outside, and knew her words for a lie.

He had expressed pleasure at her playing. Complimented her selections. He had understood what she was trying to tell him, the things for which she lacked the words. It was, in short, the best possible outcome.

"So why the silence, Doctor? What lesson should I take from that?"

_And why am I here alone in the dark brooding over it? He's not obligated to send me a damn thing. Maybe that's the lesson. Showing me how dependent I am, Doctor? How addicted I've become? Newsflash: I already learned that lesson months ago. _

She knocked her foot against the wall, annoyed at the downpour for keeping her from going for a run and at her brain for refusing to give the topic a rest. With a frustrated growl, she abandoned the wineglass on the coffee table.

Sweeping through her bedroom in a manner not unlike the storm outside, she scooped up every bit of laundry and dumped it in the basket. At the very least, she could find something useful _and_ soothing to do for the rest of the night.

Tomorrow would be soon enough to find out why the doctor had altered his pattern – and correct his misconceptions.

* * *

><p><strong>Sept. 18, 1992<strong>

"TV news in the lounge is squawking up a storm. Heh. Get it? Storm?" Donald Phillips tossed a pack of Twinkies on the desk. "Here, have some sugar. We're gonna be here awhile. Know what they're saying? Stupidest place to be right now is in a goddamned basement. So where the hell am I? In a goddamned basement, that's where. Fucking job."

He dropped gracelessly into the empty chair and craned his neck to look at the little monitors stacked on the desk. The handful of cells in the maximum security ward stared back on equipment so old it might be run by hamsters on little wheels. Travis DiNozzo had heard Don make that joke 47 times in the three weeks he'd been on the job.

"How'd ya do with the loonies while I was gone? No trouble, right?" Don elbowed his companion. "What'd I tell ya, like cake and pie. Nobody even comes down here except that FBI chick, now word's got out that he don't talk to the press and the head doctors. Fine piece of ass, that woman. You met her yet?"

Don reached for the Twinkies, tore open the bag, and shoved a yellow cake in his mouth. He mumbled something that might have been "you don't mind sharing, right?"

Travis turned his head away to hide his disgusted grimace.

"Uh, no, you go ahead."

He was on this detail to fill in for some guy with a busted leg, and the worst part about it wasn't the "loonies," as Don called them. It was sitting next to Don for eight hours, listening to his feeble jokes and his tales of conquest, smelling the stink of stale sweat and vending-machine food, and trying to find a comfortable position in the torture devices some pencil-pushing clerk had decided made suitable office chairs.

The asylum thing was just a temp gig, he reminded himself. Extra money in the pockets, a reason to get out of the house and avoid another lecture about cousin Anthony making something of himself at university. "Male nurse" just wasn't meeting his father's expectations. "Prison guard" had a much manlier ring to it.

By the time Travis turned back, Don had swallowed, mostly; some bits of yellow still clung to his lips and teeth when he spoke.

"The weather chick they got out in the storm is plenty hot, though. You wanna go check her out, I can hold the fort."

"I'm not due for a break yet."

Don laughed.

"Won't be for a while, either. Relief shift prolly won't get in on account of the rain. You seen it coming down? That shit's crazy, man. Weather chick says this bitch Danielle moving in off the coast is gonna go Cat 3."

Travis swiveled to scan the sagging shelves stuffed haphazardly with binders.

"Is there a special procedure for that? Do we need to do anything?"

He stood up and reached for a likely candidate. His careful tugging dislodged the binder in question - as well as three or four others alongside it. The shift was too much for the overburdened shelf. Travis jumped backward, knocking his leg against his empty chair and sending it rolling across the room as the shelf snapped and an avalanche of binders clattered to the floor.

Don howled with laughter.

"Shit, kid, you're great entertainment. Barney's such a serious fella. You ought to see about sticking around when his leg's healed."

Not likely, Travis thought. _'Hell no' is more like it._

He bent down and picked up a few of the manuals before realizing there was nowhere to put them. The shelf was a loss, and the shelf above it was already stuffed full. No way was he touching that. He laid the binders back down and retrieved his chair.

"So, procedures? For hurricane safety?"

"Enh. Prolly, yeah. This shit always blows itself out before too long anyway. Newscasters are a buncha pansies, get everybody riled up about nothing. I've been here four years. Haven't been scared off by rain yet. Them upstairs want us to do something, they'll let us know. Relax, kid."

Travis smiled as he silently swore at the moron beside him.

"Sure. I'll do that. I just think we should, you know, be prepared. In case something happens."

Don laughed and proceeded to tell a story about his days in the Boy Scouts involving baseball cleats, a rope, and the pillows of every one of his campmates.

Five hours later, Travis was really wishing his shift had turned out as well as his partner's boyhood adventure.

* * *

><p><strong>Sept. 18, 1992<strong>

In previous years, Hannibal Lecter had spent his post-dinner hours in pleasant pursuits, reading and sketching, or perhaps penning the occasional piece for the psychiatric journals. In the year and a half since his failed escape attempt, however, good ol' Freddie had yet to return any such materials to him.

So it was that he was alone with his thoughts, punctuated only by noises from the nearby cells. It was early yet, perhaps six o'clock, he judged, but the lights had already been dimmed. Such had been common the last few weeks. From the orderlies' chatter, he had deduced that Barney had been struck by a car and suffered injuries that would keep him on medical leave for months, possibly to return with metal pins in one leg. There was some confusion on that point.

His absence left the obnoxious Mr. Phillips as the senior orderly for the floor, and that meant lights-out early, as though the inhabitants were preschool-age children whose bedtimes were set to allow the adults their fun after all had been tucked in. It was a minor annoyance, hardly worth noting, given that the doctor's perfect recall did not depend upon the lighting level in his cell.

He settled himself on his bunk, hands resting lightly just below his breastbone, and conjured up the image of Clarice Starling with her good bag and her bad shoes standing before him on her very first visit. He would proceed chronologically, noting the changes in her attitudes and responses toward him. He slipped deeper into the memory, hearing the pitch of her voice, smelling the scent of her hand cream and the whiff of her perfume and... the moist chill of fresh water? That was odd and out of place.

He let the memory fade. His eyes remained closed as he inhaled, his mouth slightly open. The sour smell of his fellow inmates was unpleasant, but it was easy enough to dismiss. The general damp, musty basement odor was also nothing new. But alongside it was a new note, a fresh note. He stood and allowed the smell to come to him, turning to face the front of his cell, moving closer to its small ventilation holes. Yes, fresh water and a hint of ozone.

His eyes snapped open, searching the far wall. There, near the top of the stone, a trickle of water had begun. It slipped down the wall and pushed slowly across the floor. The slope led to small overflow drains set in the floor. All quite common, except for the speed of the trickle. He considered the evidence.

A simple rainstorm would be unlikely to have the volume or the force necessary. Damage at the ground floor level or particularly oversaturated soil could increase the rate of flow. Rapid rainfall, of course, and it was hurricane season. Hmm.

Put together, such things could spell opportunity. The doctor returned, unhurried, to his bunk. Water took time to do its work, but it could wreak incredible damage - and leave great beauty behind, he reminded himself, his thoughts full of river canyons and rock formations the world over. Perhaps the stones of the asylum were ready for some upheaval of their own.

The scents grew stronger as the time passed, and he rose to check upon his unexpected meteorological experiment. It was perhaps eight o'clock, he thought. Were Barney working tonight, the doctor would have expected to see him making a round of the cells, possibly stopping for a chat before returning to his observations. Thankfully, Mr. Phillips had no compunctions about inadequately performing his job duties.

If he had, the doctor considered, he would have seen the trouble immediately. The storm drains outside the asylum must be blocked - perhaps nearby, perhaps miles away, it was no matter. The effect was the same: Water was not draining through the small overflow grates. Instead, it was quietly pooling at the grates and slowly rising. The installers so many decades ago had not predicted the need for backflow flaps to prevent what was happening now - water entering, rather than leaving, through the lovely little drains set in the old stone floor.

If the rain persisted and the blockage was not removed, the water level might rise enough to become a hazard. It was not uncommon, in violent weather, for residential basements to see three to eight inches of water per hour. The doctor smiled at the thought, inhaling a whiff of freedom along with the less pleasant air of back-flowing sewage, household chemicals and oils - everything so casually dumped down storm drains without thought to where it might eventually end up.

Were Barney in charge tonight, appropriate procedures would have already begun. Dirty water was a risk to the patients' health, which was a violation of state and federal law, which would necessitate moving the entire wing to an uncontaminated floor until cleanup measures could be taken. Given that he himself was farthest from the exit and that moving him required the use of the hand truck, the doctor might have expected to be first in the evacuation parade.

The water continued to rise. His neighbors slept or remained otherwise occupied, though he suspected the former from their breathing patterns. None sounded an alarm, though the water now covered the floor from the far wall to the edge of the cells. Indeed, it likely covered part of the other cells as well, only sparing his because it could not slip through the Plexiglas as it could the bars. Instead, it lapped gently at the clear barrier. He had time, yet, before it rose high enough to spill inside the ventilation holes.

He used that time to run the scenario from every angle. Chance and circumstance or no, he would not be brought down as he had been in Memphis. He would not be caged again. He would leave this place, tonight, and he would... _visit Clarice_.

The unlooked-for thought came as something of a surprise. Was her hold upon him so complete? Of the many joys he had been denied in the last nine years, he had not expected his mind to be so dominated by a single, recent addition. _I will see her without walls between us._

It was a risky proposition. Her path had drawn close to his own, but they were not entirely aligned. It was early yet in their deepening relationship. He could not pass up the opportunity for escape, should it come tonight, but persuading Special Agent Clarice Starling to abandon her current life to take up with a fugitive whom she had only previously encountered as something akin to a zoo animal? A beloved pet? No, that would be asking too much.

Long moments passed as he stared at the rising water and banished his hopes and his lingering melancholy to the depths of memory. There would be time enough for such thoughts later. Now, there was only the singular purpose - escape - and the ever-growing predatory mindset to accomplish it.


	21. Chapter 21

**Sept. 18-19, 1992**

An uneasiness rose in his gut as Travis studied the monitors. The dim lighting and the poor quality surveillance system made it difficult to see clearly, but something was definitely off.

"Don?"

No response.

Travis shoved his partner a bit harder than necessary to wake him from his nightly doze. "Yo, Don."

"Hunh? M'awake, m'awake." The chair groaned as Don sat up and turned to look at him. "Whatcha need, kid?" His eyes went to the clock. "It's hardly past ten. You making a snack run?"

"No... check this out." Travis tapped his finger on the monitors. "That look weird to you?"

"Weird how, kid?"

"The floor. It's like it's moving or something. I know the equipment's bad, but it's not _that_ bad."

They studied the screens in silence, ending with Don's low growl. _"Shit."_

Travis waited while Don called upstairs to the night desk to inform them of the problem. Eventually he covered the mouthpiece. "On hold while they call the director. Bring up the lights, kid, and check the door."

The lights operated on a dimmer, and Travis dialed it up to normal daytime levels. The system would take a moment to catch up; it always did. He got out his keys and unlocked the door sealing off the observation room from the cage to enter the secured area. The door felt heavy under his hand. Too late, he realized why.

Water flooded in, swirling around his lower calves, shockingly cold. It had to be at least six inches deep. He yelped. Don looked over and swore some more before cutting himself off in mid-curse to utter a rapid, urgent request for assistance into the phone.

The lights finally came up, and with them the inmates' shouts as they woke to find water in their cells, swiftly rising toward their bunks. Travis shut his ears to the angry threats. Don finally put down the phone.

"What a fucking mess."

Travis waited, impatient to get this over with and get out of the water soaking his shoes, socks, and pants.

"We're taking 'em out, transfer protocol, one at a time, up the elevator if the water ain't hit it yet" - Don kicked his foot in frustration, splashing water - "fucking unlikely, if ya ask me, or up the stairs if it has. They're setting up the rooms now; we gotta go with full shackles on everybody, Christ, it's gonna take forever with ankle chains, up all them stairs-"

A hissing sound preceded a sharp crack, and the ceiling spat sparks as the power died. The men stood in the darkness. "Sunova_bitch_!"

The emergency lighting clicked on with a whine, backup generators fulfilling their function and bathing the area in pale blue light with sharp green "exit" reminders above the doors. The shouts from the cell block increased.

"Grab a set of shackles, kid, and let's get moving." Don slogged through the water, Travis following behind. "We'll start at the first cell and work our way back to Mr. Celebrity. Let 'im wait a while and see how he likes it."

It took the two of them nearly half an hour to get the first prisoner shackled, marched up the stairs, and placed in an isolation room more commonly used to prevent self-injury. Their efficiency increased as they moved down the line, but the rising water continued to complicate the procedure, and they gained little time.

It was after midnight when they were ready to make the final trip down the hallway, all the way to the end this time, sweaty from exertion and humidity, soaked in water now brushing their knees and lapping over the second step on the staircase that led upward to the prisoners' temporary accommodations.

"Don?"

"Yeah, kid?" The supervisor's voice was weary with exhaustion, too deadened from hours of exertion to bother with jokes or annoyance.

"How are we going to get him on the rolling cart in this? And keep it moving through the water? And push it up the stairs?"

Don stared blankly at him in the blue emergency glow.

"Shit. We shoulda started with that bastard."

Travis silently agreed.

"Okay. Okay, we'll..." It was painful, watching Don think. "We'll use the shackles and the mask - fuck, the mask is gonna be tricky - and jab him with the cow stick if he gives us any trouble. I'd rather drag that fucker unconscious through the water than get my face torn off."

The "cow stick" was an electrified baton similar to a cattle prod. Travis unlocked the weapons cabinet and grabbed one, adding shackles and the special mask to his load.

They waded through the water to the end of the hall. The prisoner was waiting for them, standing calmly in the middle of his cell, his hands politely clasped behind his back. Travis still had trouble looking him in the eye. His grandmother would have crossed herself against the devil if she had ever run across this man and his knowing stare. He hadn't just bitten into an apple from the Tree of Knowledge; he'd gorged himself on a bushel and probably outwitted the snake with his cunning tongue.

Travis' eyes flicked between Don and the monster. Don sloshed his way up to the glass, where the water had poured in through the holes and equalized at knee height. It was still rising.

"So here's the deal, Doc. You do what I tell you, and you get a nice trip upstairs to a dry room. You don't, you can stay down here and float until you drown. I don't care either way. Travis here is gonna put your mask and a set of shackles in the food carrier and send it through. You're gonna put 'em on, proper-like, before this door opens. Anything goes wrong after that, and it's fry time. You get me?"

"Your instructions are quite clear, Mr. Phillips, and it would be foolish of me not to follow them."

Cool as a cucumber, that guy, Travis thought.

"Yeah, you just remember that. Kid, send him the stuff."

Travis opened the carrier, laid the mask and shackles inside, and pushed them through.

"Thank you, Travis." The monster removed the mask first. "You know, I really hate this part."

"S-sorry," Travis said, though he wasn't sure what impulse compelled him. "It's just procedure. Nothing, nothing personal."

The monster studied him in the blue light.

"Indeed," he murmured. "For you, I think it is not."

Then his face disappeared behind the mask as he buckled it with nimble fingers, turning his head sideways to show the tension in the straps.

"Acceptable, gentlemen?" His voice was muffled through the mask.

"Don't get cute, Doc," Don said. "The shackles, now, before I decide standing in this water is bad for my health."

"It is, actually," the monster said, as though the three of them were having a casual conversation on a sunny afternoon. Travis backed away from the glass. The monster lifted the shackles and began fastening the ankle locks, bending his face near the water to reach them. "Storm drains can be quite filthy places with all sorts of noisome contaminants."

He finished closing the chains around both ankles and wrists. "Shall we?"

Don grabbed Travis' shoulder and pulled him forward. "Keep that stick ready. I'm opening the door."

The monster did not move toward the door as it opened.

"Go on, then." Don waved him forward. "You first, Doc."

The monster nodded. His stride was a slow shuffle, with the weight of the shackles, the restriction of the chain, and the drag of the water combining to make movement awkward. Don and Travis followed behind.

The pace slowed further at the stairs, the monster fumbling to raise his feet high enough to crest each riser. The stairs wound upward, over and back around on themselves. It was two levels to the main floor and a third to the floor where the prisoner's new room waited.

At the landing just shy of the main floor, the monster stopped and leaned against the wall. His breathing, harsh and loud, echoed off the walls.

"Keep moving, Doc. You got three seconds before you get the stick."

Travis looked at Don, wide-eyed, his hand shaking on the cattle prod.

"A… moment… please," the monster answered between gasps.

"Fuck this." Don snatched the prod from Travis' hand and crossed the two steps between the orderlies and their prisoner.

When Travis would describe this moment to the authorities later, he could only say the monster moved with the speed of the striking snake. One moment he seemed a weak old man on the brink of a heart attack; the next he had bull-rushed Don, slamming his back into the railing, grabbing his legs and flipping him over to fall to the water below.

Somehow the monster held Don's keys and the cattle prod. The shackles dropped to the ground.

"Well, young Travis, it seems you have a decision to make. You may, if you like, attempt to subdue me, and I will send a lovely electrical current through your body until you pass out. I must admit, I wouldn't mind seeing that. On the other hand, our dear Mr. Phillips is now lying in the water below. He may have struck his head on the railing as he fell. He might even now be drowning without your aid, Travis. Which is more important to you, hmm? Are you the nurse who tends to the patient you can help or the guard who launches a foolish attack at an enemy he cannot defeat?"

The cattle prod's menacing tip hovered inches from his throat. Travis swallowed, staring up at the devil's eyes above the mask. He backed down a step. Extra money or no, this job wasn't worth his life. He was quitting, tomorrow for sure, and going back to nursing full-time. He turned and ran down the steps to help the big blowhard lying facedown in filthy water. Whatever happened to the devil was no longer his concern.


	22. Chapter 22

**Sept. 19, 1992**

The neighborhood was dark as Hannibal Lecter drove the stolen car past his target and circled the block. The driving rain had become merely spitting, but fallen branches and scattered lawn furniture testified to the storm's former fury. It was nearing 4 a.m. now, thanks to a pause to switch cars and swipe some clothing to replace his prison blues, yet the streetlights remained unlit and not a single home or business in the surrounding blocks showed a glimmer. The power was undoubtedly out; a satisfactory condition, to his mind.

Preferring not to approach from the front, the doctor parked on the neighboring block and traveled across the unfenced backyards to Clarice's patio. The wet grass clung to his shoes; he took a moment to brush them clean on the mat outside the back door. Despite the odd circumstances of his arrival, there was no cause to be rude.

Things would become more difficult to anticipate from this point on. Locating Clarice's home, having memorized her address months ago, had been a simple matter; entering her home without first ascertaining the whereabouts of her roommate and whether both women slept would be… _fun. Let us hope you'll leave the guns out of this, hmm, Clarice?_

He quietly picked the lock, the substandard sort found in rental properties and tract homes across the country, and gently eased open the door. Stepping inside, he took note of his surroundings. A laundry alcove. Damp clothes lay spread out atop the dryer – _doing the wash when the power failed, Clarice?_ – and the mingled scents of mustiness and detergent tickled his nose.

Listening carefully, he heard no noises of note from within. Not even the hum of a working refrigerator disturbed the quiet. He stepped into the kitchen. It took less than a moment to deduce that this room was shared; if nothing else, the mess of notes and photos attached to the refrigerator would tell him so. His night vision was better than most, but even he could not make out the details in this darkness. An emergency flashlight lay on the table; he picked it up, pleased with Clarice's excellent preparedness skills, and carried it with him into the hall.

It wouldn't do to turn it on just yet; no, if either roommate was still awake at this hour – and knowing Clarice's tendency toward disturbing dreams, he thought it quite likely that her sleep would be troubled and wakeful – the light might bring one or both of them to investigate. No, that wouldn't do at all. This encounter must be carefully controlled, lest it become too dangerous.

The hall led to the front door; the entry area contained a coat closet and a side table for sundries. A set of hooks on the wall held two windbreakers with the letters FBI across the back and a long gray coat he recognized as Clarice's. The fourth hook was empty. Perhaps Ms. Mapp had gone out for the evening and not returned because of the weather? That would be a stroke of good fortune.

The front entry concluded the shared section of the house; to explore further, he must return to the two facing doors that opened into the hall. The door to his left was closed; the door to his right stood ajar. He moved closer to peer inside without touching it, and his inhalation brought Clarice's scent to him. Yes, that side of the house would be hers.

He was forced to pause to control his reaction. The brush of her finger in Memphis had been like the gentle swell of a calm sea compared to the surge washing through him now. She was here, now, and all that separated them was his self-control. Neither bars nor glass stood between them. His behavior in this encounter would define how she thought of him in the future, would ultimately determine whether she could only accept his attentions from a "safe" distance.

He backed away from her door and turned to the other. It was necessary to see to her roommate first; if she was indeed present, he would be forced to incapacitate her before speaking to Clarice. He could not leave his freedom to chance.

The knob turned easily under his hand; a staircase beckoned. The air tasted stale on his tongue, and the floral scent seemed manufactured rather than natural. He was cautious with his footing on the treads, stepping toward the walls to avoid the creak-laden sagging centers. The stairs emerged in a parlor with sofa and other unimportant minutia of the roommate's life, which he cataloged without thought and passed over. Three open doors revealed a bathroom and two bedrooms, none occupied.

_Excellent. There's no one here to disturb us, Clarice. I believe it's time we truly met, don't you?_

He returned to the first floor and the open door, his senses humming with heightened awareness. Such a reaction was to be expected where Clarice Starling was concerned. He lightly pushed on the door with his fingers and slipped through the opening.

Two overstuffed chairs; a coffee table upon which rested her violin case; a small bookcase crammed with books and binders and papers. There were no photos or knickknacks scattered about as there were in the roommate's sitting room. There were no stairs, either; apparently Clarice had taken the smaller apartment, with only the sitting room, the bathroom in evidence through an open door, and what he presumed to be her bedroom through the final door on the wall to the left as he entered.

It was to that door he moved with unbecoming speed. She made him forget himself at times. But that was not an acceptable excuse for hasty action; the responsibility for his actions lay with him, always, and he would not pollute what they shared. He stood at the door and calmed himself listening to the rise and fall of her breath. Slow, steady, peaceful. He allowed her breathing to guide his own. If his presence disturbed her overmuch, it might be the last moment of calm they shared.

The door yielded to his touch. He moved forward, to the foot of the bed, noting as he did the sparseness of the décor. Much like the sitting room, the bedroom was functional rather than personal. A bed. A nightstand. A dresser. Bare walls. He was struck by how little it differed from his former accommodation at the asylum. _The things that tie her to this life are psychological, not physical; she has no true attachment to this place._

That made his task both easier and more difficult. True, she had fewer things holding her back – but those that did meant more and would not be as easily discarded as a pile of objects. Even his gifts to her were not in view; perhaps she kept them close but secret. _It wouldn't do to display them openly, hmm?_

An emergency lantern sat atop the nightstand, its battery-powered light dark for now. Worrisome, though, was the lack of her service pistol. He had expected to see it near to hand; was it in the drawer instead? Under her pillow? To risk opening the drawer was to risk waking her; if the gun lay under her pillow, she might mistake him for a common intruder and fire before he could subdue her.

_Quite the challenge you present, my dear._

He allowed his eyes, at last, to rest upon her sleeping form. She lay on her back nearer the side of the bed where the nightstand stood, the comforter almost to her chin. Her hair tumbled quite fetchingly about her face. His eyes widened, seeking out every scrap of detail even as his ears memorized the pattern of her breaths and his nose captured the sweet, warm, slightly musky air hanging in the room. His fingers itched to touch her, to be certain the spark of Memphis had not been a singular moment never to be repeated.

The sheets rustled as her legs shifted beneath them. He stood immobile, waiting for her to settle again. She rolled on her side, toward the center of the bed. Her eyes slipped open. He tensed, preparing to respond to what might be a well-deserved mix of anger and panic – it was unlikely that her night vision matched his own, and a shadow looming over the foot of her bed in the middle of the night was likely to receive an aggressively negative welcome.

So it was that he was surprised – an emotion with which he had very little experience – when she neither shouted nor attacked him. And he was shocked – an emotion with which he had even less experience – by what she did do.

She blinked at him, sleepily, seemingly unconcerned. She stretched an arm across the empty half of the bed, her hand ineffectually pushing at the sheets. And before her eyes slid shut once more, she mumbled the words that so shocked the doctor.

"S'dark out. Come back to bed, Hannibal."

He considered, for a moment, that he had hallucinated the entire experience. The storm, the escape, her words – all of it nothing more than memory giving way to imagination and desire, his supposed insanity catching up with him after nine years in a box. It was a vivid hallucination, true, but his mind was a vivid place. It wasn't outside the realm of possibility.

On the other hand… satisfaction flooded through him. Clarice Starling might not, on a conscious level, be prepared to abandon her current life for one with him, but her subconscious had clearly already made the leap. Asleep, she accepted that their proper place was beside one another.

He was tempted to follow her suggestion, to discard his shoes and lie down beside her, but only for a moment. Such an action would be unworthy of her; awake, she would not have made such a statement. At some undefined point in the future, perhaps, but not now, when she had yet to truly encounter him without barriers between them.

He allowed himself one more look, one more moment to savor the sound of her voice, husky and sleep-filled, caressing the syllables of his given name, before he moved to the nightstand and switched on the emergency lantern.

Either the sound or the brightness was enough to wake her; she rolled in his direction, her right arm thrusting out from under the covers without hesitation, aiming for the nightstand drawer. His arm shot out faster, grasping her wrist and pulling it away.

"My apologies for the abrupt awakening, Clarice, but I believe this discussion will be safer for us both without firearms involved, hmm?"

Her muscles tensed; he could feel her pulse racing under his fingers. She didn't struggle, didn't attempt to pull out of his grip. She blinked at the lantern's brightness, breathed deeply, swallowed. When she spoke, her voice was no longer rough with sleep, he noted. He found he rather missed the huskiness.

"Dr. Lecter. I don't think I'd be overstating the case to say I'm surprised to see you here."

Her voice barely trembled at all. He approved.

"It was a surprise to me as well, Clarice, but circumstances proved amenable this evening."

"The storm. It knocked the power out? But surely there were backup generators."

"Indeed. It also breached the walls with no small amount of flooding, which necessitated a relocation for myself and the others on the basement level."

She frowned, her thoughts lining her face.

"How many people died so you could be here now, Doctor?"

He relaxed his grip on her wrist, rubbing his thumb over her skin. It was smooth and soft, as he'd expected, but expectation couldn't compete with true feeling.

"Would you add the count to your nightly chorus, Clarice? My actions are no fault of yours, my dear."

"How many?" Her eyes met his with stubborn insistence. Inwardly, he sighed, knowing she could not be who she was and still let the question go unanswered.

"One. Perhaps. He may yet survive."

She looked away, obviously struggling with his answer.

"Not Barney." There was the barest hint of a question in her voice.

"No, Clarice, not Barney. He was fortuitously absent this evening, though his absence these last few weeks has meant I was unable to continue our correspondence."

Some surprise showed on her face alongside a touch of relief. _Missing my voice, Clarice? How lovely. But you won't be sidetracked, will you? No, I think not._

"So you thought you'd drop by in person? You shouldn't be here, Doctor."

"Yes, it is a bit late – or early – for visitors, Clarice, and I do apologize for simply barging in, but I'm certain you understand I could not chance knocking. As today is the third Saturday of the month, I would have felt like quite the cad had I allowed you to make the trip to visit me later only to discover me missing."

"And you hate to be rude."

He inclined his head in agreement. "And I hate to be rude."

She sighed.

"I'm not really dressed for company, Doctor. Maybe you can give me a minute and we can adjourn to the living room?"

He studied her face and smiled.

"That wouldn't really be in my best interest, now would it, Clarice? Your impeccable sense of right and wrong would no doubt encourage you to call your co-workers – Uncle Jack, perhaps? – and then we'd be playing a much more dangerous game, wouldn't we?"

She flinched at the mention of Jack Crawford, as he expected she would.

"I swore an oath, Doctor, and even if it means nothing to some of my colleagues, it means something to me. I can't abandon my principles just because you're intelligent and charming."

Her anger had come out to play, but what she might have intended as a firm declaration sounded more like a naked plea to his ears. She was fighting to convince herself she was still the woman she displayed on the surface and not the complex creature underneath.

"No." He abandoned all pretense of restraint at her wrist, as she seemed just as unwilling as he to pull away, and trailed his index finger along the underside of her arm. "No, I don't expect you could, Clarice." _Not quite yet._

He did not tell her the corollary to that belief: that she must, if their relationship was to move forward, find a way to accept his actions, his understanding of justice, within her principled framework. Not an abandonment, to his way of thinking - merely a shift. She had been moving in that direction since January, growing more able to see herself as the arbiter of her own justice, but letting go of the FBI - truly, letting go of her paean to her dead father - was not yet acceptable to her, he knew, no matter how strong her attachment to the doctor himself.

"So where does that leave us, Doctor?"

"You understand I cannot stay here."

She nodded. Her eyes narrowed, and pain flickered across her face. "You understand I'm... not ready to leave?"

Her answer was no less than he had expected; it was, in fact, a great deal more hopeful than most of the scenarios he had envisioned. At least no bullets had been involved thus far. And she had not rejected the idea outright, he reminded himself.

"Of course, Clarice. You need not worry; I have no intention of forcing you to go. Perhaps in time, your answer will change."

Much as he wished to, he could not dally. There was much to do before Jack Crawford and his inept investigators began sniffing out his trail. He reluctantly removed his hand from her arm and took a half-step back, careful to remain between her and the nightstand drawer.

"Dr. Lecter?" Clarice pushed herself into a seated position, letting the covers pool about her waist. He would not allow his eyes to drop below her collarbone, its line visible at the neck of her simple nightshirt. "You haven't claimed your forfeit."

He paused, performing a quick mental review. No, he wasn't wrong. Best to be certain she knew what she was about.

"I heard no significant imperfections in your playing, Clarice. You owe me nothing."

A pause. A breath. Determined eyes lifting to meet his own.

"Perhaps we don't reckon imperfection the same way, Doctor. I'm quite sure I counted four."

_Brave Clarice._

"Quite sure, Clarice?" He stepped closer. She met his challenge, rising to her knees and laying her hand on his chest. If her fingers trembled, it was not in fear.

"Quite sure, Doctor."

His hand moved to rest lightly against her back between her shoulder blades as she drifted toward him. They were nearly of a height; it was a simple matter to lower his chin and claim her mouth.

Her lips moved gently under his own. It was, all things considered, a relatively chaste kiss. His mouth remained closed. It wouldn't do to tempt fate so strongly, not now that he had complete confidence Memphis hadn't been a fluke.

His left hand caressed her back, memorizing every dip and curve of her spine through the soft cotton of her nightshirt. His right brushed the hair back from her cheek and settled against her neck, fingers delighting in the rapid pace of her pulse.

It was odd, though not uncomfortable, to feel her own hands exploring his chest and shoulders. Her light touches grew firmer as they kissed, fingers digging into his muscles seemingly without concern for reprisal.

Despite months of thinking and planning and rational consideration, the intensity of his response startled him. Perhaps he had not appropriately quantified the depth of his feelings for Clarice Starling. Perhaps he had underestimated the importance of touch, having felt nothing but the impersonal, hostile, and fear-filled grips of his keepers for nine years.

But her touch… her touch was as warm and welcoming as her mouth, parting now under his, opening to him without reservation. _She has no fear. None at all._ The pleasure was so intense he thought he might weep. He deepened the kiss and she responded in kind.

Her quiet moan rolled through him like a wave, finally disrupting the purely sensuous experience as he realized where he had allowed his thoughts to travel. It would be the worst sort of discourtesy to let this continue, to claim her body only to abandon her. He could not take her with him, not in these first uncertain days, not when he had no papers prepared for her. Such work would take delicacy and time… and he would not leave her feeling used, betrayed, and discarded.

Once the decision had been made, he imposed his will upon his body with strict discipline. He gentled the kiss, returned it to its former chaste state, and stilled his roaming hands. When he pulled back, it was with the hope that she had not realized how close to uncontrolled he had been.

Her head tipped slightly to the right and her hands busied themselves smoothing his shirt as she slowly opened her eyes. He saw instantly that not only had she recognized his lapse but she had also felt the same conflict in herself. She needed no reassurance of her desirability, no promises from him; she _knew_.

"Time to go, Doctor?" Her tone was light, her faint smile understanding.

He checked his heart rate, his respiration, his self-control; all being well in hand, he permitted himself a final kiss pressed to her forehead. Her skin was warm under his lips; her heart, unlike his, had not stopped racing.

"Time to go," he agreed. "If you'd be so kind as to delay your phone call until after I've gone, Clarice, I'd be most appreciative."

Her face scrunched up in distaste, and he thought perhaps he had pressed for too much, though it might only be the reminder of the difficulties of their situation that was distasteful to her.

"Actually, Doctor… I believe I've been asleep all night." Her words came slowly, as though she reconsidered each before speaking it, but she didn't look away. "If you visited here after your… escape… I wouldn't know."

He was struck by a fierce urge to kiss her again. She was a true delight, surprising him as if she were born to do so. It was only the knowledge of how thin his control truly was in her presence that kept him from acting. He smiled softly at her instead.

"Thank you, Clarice." He stepped away, unerringly finding the door even though his eyes never left her face. She was watching him in return, up until the moment he passed through the frame and pulled the door closed behind him.

He paused in the stillness of the living room. No sound passed through the door; she had not attempted to call for assistance or report his presence. As he turned to go, he heard the faintest whisper of a long, shuddering sigh, a pained exhalation that pained him in kind, like the persistent ache of a broken bone long healed.

He left swiftly, then, unwilling to chance his much vaunted self-control in a fight he could not win.


	23. Epilogue

**Dec. 22, 1992**

"Junk, junk, water bill, card for me, junk, coupons, oooh card for you!" Ardelia tossed the junk mail on the kitchen table and held out a slightly bulging envelope. "You think they sent pictures or something for Christmas?"

Clarice took the envelope with some curiosity; she had no one to send her Christmas cards. The return address indicated it had come from the Lutheran Home in Bozeman. _Ridiculous. I haven't lived there in nine years, and they decide to send a card now? No. _

She had to fight to keep the dawning understanding off her face. _There's only one person in the world who might send me a card and need to disguise it._

"Could be pictures, but I doubt it." Clarice shrugged, as though the envelope held no interest, even though her fingers burned to tear it open. _More than three months with no word, Doctor? You expected they'd be scanning my mail._ "Probably a request for end-of-the-year charity donations. There's never enough money to go around."

"Bummer," Ardelia offered. She added her latest card to the collection on the refrigerator, all addressed to her, all from friends or family wishing her a happy holiday season. "You know you're still welcome to come home with me – heading out tomorrow morning, back Sunday."

"Naw, you deserve to spend time with your folks and everybody without worrying about me, Dee." Clarice gave her roommate her best apologetic smile. "Besides, the whole family thing at Christmas … it's just not me. It's not the same, you know?"

"Yeah, I know." Ardelia gave her a sideways hug. "I gotta get my gifts wrapped. You good?"

"I'm good. Go, go." Clarice made shooing motions with her hands. "I don't want the blame when your nieces and nephews don't get their presents on time."

"If they don't say 'thank you' this year, I'm gonna take the presents right back outta their hands. Greedy little urchins, the lot of 'em." Clarice laughed as Ardelia headed down the hallway to her upstairs apartment. "Why'd my sibs have to be so damn prolific?"

"You know you love 'em all."

"Ain't that the truth."

Ardelia disappeared up the stairs. Clarice sat at the table for a few more minutes, tapping the edge of the envelope lightly against the wood until she heard the floorboards shift as her roommate moved about upstairs. Then she walked – _no, don't run, Clarice, show some restraint_ – into her own space and closed the door behind her.

She found it took effort to regulate her breathing. Nothing on the outer envelope even hinted that it was him, that the doctor had broken his months-long silence, yet she _knew_ it could be no one else.

The living room didn't feel private enough for such communication; she bypassed the plush chairs and headed straight for her bedroom, closing that door, too. Now she was alone, alone in the last place she had seen him, alone enough to remember the feel of his lips and the warmth of his hand sweeping over her back.

She piled the pillows behind her and curled up against the head of the bed. The envelope flap peeled away with help from eager fingers. The contents slid out into her palm.

It was… a Christmas card. A small-town church with a bell tower, snow lightly blanketing the surrounding fields… as traditionally bucolic an image as one might expect on such a card. Clarice half-expected to hear a choir break into _Silent Night_ at any moment.

The card wasn't quite closed; something tucked inside prevented the thin cardstock from lying flat in her palm. She tipped the card, dropping its hidden cargo into her other hand. The card itself merely contained a standard verse and Christmas wishes purporting to be from the Lutheran Home. Clarice let it fall to the comforter. She would take it out to the kitchen later, place it on the refrigerator next to Ardelia's collection, and allay any lingering suspicion.

For now, though, her eyes fixed on the other object – an icy blue envelope with her name precisely centered in flowing script. The paper had a richness to it, a thickness and weight that her fingers rushed to embrace.

Seeing her name in his handwriting again, even not knowing what his message would be, was enough to unleash an emotional cascade. There had been… _call it what it is, Clarice_… a fear in the back of her mind.

She knew, rationally, that he could not have contacted her immediately. In those first few days, there had been talk of protective custody, concern for her safety, countless discussions with Jack Crawford, and uncomfortable profiling sessions with the rest of the BSU team. But knowing it and feeling it were two entirely distinct entities.

As the weeks passed, it became impossible to ignore the voice that suggested he might have found other interests. Their talks had amused him when his entertainment options had been strictly limited, but now he had the world at his disposal. What need did he have for her?

The envelope in her hands, whatever message it contained, was proof that he hadn't forgotten her.

The flap was sealed with wax, an "L" imprinted in the center. Clarice smiled, tracing it with her finger. _So formal, Doctor?_

The wax cracked as she lifted the flap and extracted the letter. A single sheet, as usual. _Some things never change._

**Dearest Clarice,**

**You know, of course, the difficulties inherent in such communication between us. Would it ease your mind to know that you are daily in my thoughts? Perhaps instead it disturbs you. Know this, then: The uncertainties that absence and distance bring into sharp clarity, the thoughts that plague you, plague me also.**

**I shall not intrude upon you again, Clarice. Correspondence presents a danger to us both, and I would not have you turn to me only because my actions have brought about your downfall in the halls of the FBI. If our relationship is to develop, it must be a positive choice on your part, Clarice. **

**Lest you think me unaffected, I say to you now, I believe in the power of the music building between us. As of yet, we have heard only the overture. Will you initiate the first steps of Act I, Clarice? **

**Should you choose to do so, a personal ad on the first of any month in the Times or the International Herald Tribune will find me. **

**Perhaps Dante best captured the swirl of emotions one cannot entirely suppress. **_**Tutti **__**li **__**mei **__**penser**__**….**_

**I remain, always,**

**Faithfully yours,**

**Hannibal**

She shook with mingled relief and fear.

_My choice. You knew that would make it harder… and ultimately, more meaningful, didn't you, Doctor? You're asking for a leap of faith._

This wasn't an answer she could come to overnight. Too many variables already raced to be the first to draw her attention.

Was the burning under her skin love or mere curiosity? She had always appreciated a challenge. What if it was nothing more than that for both of them? Even now, he might be playing an elaborate game with her disillusionment and death as its final move. No matter how dissatisfied she might be with her career or how alone she might be every damn day, there was no way to hide the fact that walking away would mean putting her life in his hands.

Was it naïve to believe he would accept such a gift gently, with courtesy and grace?

_It seems you have some thinking to do, Clarice._

"I guess I do, Doctor."

* * *

><p><strong>June 1, 1993<strong>

Hannibal Lecter rose with the sun, as was his habit. Breakfast on the balcony gave him ample time to witness the myriad changes in the city below as the light expanded across homes and shops and parks and danced along the river. The view served as a reminder of his freedom.

The Baltimore asylum was nearly nine months behind him, but its effects lingered, an irritant not unlike a grain of sand in one's eye. He lived quietly for now, avoiding old haunts, old behaviors, with meticulous care. Today, his balcony was in Salzburg; its towering baroque beauty was lovely in spring, before the summer brought unwelcome humidity.

At his request, the hotel had left papers for him this morning - the Times and the International Herald Tribune - and he turned his attention to them as he sipped his tea. It was the first of June. He had kept up his customary perusal with faithful attention, though in five months he had yet to receive an answer from the ambitious young FBI agent whose intelligence and beauty had so captivated him.

But today was different. Today, his blood hummed with the promise of excitement. There, in the personals, he found her voice.

**A.A. Maestro**

**Act I awaits. Will you make your entrance? **

**A fiddler**

The phantom taste of her lips sent a current of satisfaction coursing through him as he contemplated this new development. Was she in earnest, or had she turned over his letter to Jack Crawford in a misguided attempt to please her dead father? _Mmm. Finding out may be a fun adventure for us both, Clarice. _

He rose from the breakfast table, outwardly unhurried but inwardly crackling with energy. There was much to be done.

* * *

><p><strong>Note:<strong> Although Clarice will have to search out the reference to Dante that the doctor makes in his letter, I'll include it here in the interest of completeness. The opening he quotes, "Tutti li mei penser," comes from _La Vita Nuova_, the sonnet in Section XIII: Every one of my thoughts speaks of Love: / and they have in them such great variance, / that one makes me wish for his ruler-ship, / another claims that his worth is nothing, / another by hoping brings me sweetness, / another makes me weep constantly, / and they only agree in asking pity, / trembling with the fear that is in the heart.

**Author's note:** Thank you to everyone who followed along on this adventure, particularly those who chose to share their thoughts and reactions with me through their comments and reviews. I hope it's been an entertaining ride. If you're interested in continuing, stick around and join me for the sequel, _Playing House_.


End file.
